Craghead Colliery
Watched Craghead Colliery, a documentary made by the BBC in 1969 about the fate of the Craghead Colliery and community between Newcastle and Durham. The miners performed dirty, dangerous and depressing work to provide coal and power for us. They worked hard for each other and support their families for 50 years in the pit and then often passed away shortly after retirement, suffering from chronic health conditions associated with their work.
The coal ran out, or at least, became expensive to extract. The documentary features speeches from Margaret Castle and Harold Wilson at the Durham Miners' Gala. In my opinion, the Labour Prime Minister Wilson let them down: he was evasive about their future, telling them only that a decision on the future of energy in the North East would be based on technical, economic, as well as social factors. He later buried news about the future of the mines on the day of the Soviet invasion of Czechoslovakia.
I liked Margaret Castle's words though:
I am deeply conscious of the of the tribute that you have paid in allowing me to be here this morning … you are not the ones who theorize about the need for change in Britain you are the ones who have to experience it …… By definition the Labor Party is the party of fundamental change and therefore by definition the task of a Labor government will always be more difficult than that of a Tory one.
Tags: tv