The Battle of Orgreave: Time for Change
18th June 2024 marked the 40th anniversary of the battle of Orgreave, a violent clash between police and picketing miners during the miners’ strikes of 1984 to 1985. On that date thousands of miners, fighting to stop pit closures in order to protect their jobs, their families and their communities, attended a British Steel Corporation coking plant near Rotherham in protest. Their intention was to stop lorries carrying coke leaving for the steelworks.
Approximately 6000 police officers, many of them mounted on horses or with riot shields, went to meet them and there was a violent confrontation in which over 100 people were injured. There were accounts of police brutality. The incident marked a turning point in the strike. 95 picketers were arrested and charged with serious offences. 71 were charged with rioting and 24 with violent disorder. The prosecutions collapsed, with allegations of misconduct and perjury made against officers. Michael Mansfield KC who represented the miners called it the “biggest frame-up ever”.
Decades on, and despite South Yorkshire Police in 1991 having paid £425,000 in compensation to 39 miners, there has never been a public inquiry into the Battle of Orgreave. There remain many unanswered questions about the police actions, motives and tactics together with the role of the Conservative government.
For decades the Orgreave Truth & Justice Campaign group has been calling for a full and independent inquiry, but successive governments have refused to hold one. In 2016 Amber Rudd stated in parliament that there was no place for a statutory enquiry or an independent review and that it was not in the public interest. In her ministerial statement she said that given policing had “changed fundamentally” since then, there would be “very few lessons.. to be learned”. She further said that despite “forceful accounts and arguments provided by campaigners and former miners who were present that day, about the effect that these events have had on them, ultimately there were no deaths or wrongful convictions”. At that time Sir Keir Starmer criticised the government’s stance.
Labour’s 2024 manifesto makes an explicit commitment to an Orgreave inquiry. With the notable exception of the Conservatives, the Liberal Democrats, Reform UK and the Green Party have all expressed in principle support for an inquiry.
It is essential that any inquiry is robust and independent, with those involved in the Battle of Orgreave and those campaigning on their behalf having meaningful input into the way it is set up and run. Any inquiry needs to be properly resourced and ensure forensic scrutiny of what happened on 18 June 1984, so that the truth of these events can finally be properly uncovered and wrongdoers held to account.
We can only hope that on 5th July 2024 we awake to news of an incoming government committed to truth and justice for those involved in the Battle of Orgreave: many have died without seeing justice and 4 decades on, it is time for Change.
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