Arthur Scargill a Thatcherite

[irc]

Who'd have thought it? Seems he tried to buy his flat under Thatcher's Right To Buy legislation

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-25731328

[profpointy]

Don't his actions make more sense if he were a Thatcherite agent provocateur. If he wasn't in Mrs T's pay, he missed a trick doing all her dirty work buckshee

[AlaninWales]

Don't his actions make more sense if he were a Thatcherite agent provocateur. If he wasn't in Mrs T's pay, he missed a trick doing all her dirty work buckshee

+1

[Mick F]

Just coz you take advantage of a situation doesn't mean you agree with it.

[reohn2]

FWIW,IMO Scargill was every bit as evil as Thatcher and nothing would surprise me about him in the same way nothing would surprise me about her.
They were the two extremes of idealism,bent and ruthless the pair of them.

[jezer]

I'm pleased Scargill has been exposed as the ultimate hypocrite. A capitalist posing as a socialist if ever there was one. At least he is still alive to answer for his actions, unlike his adversary.

[hondated]

I once met Scargill on a demo supporting the miners. and why he never went to ballot is beyond me, and he was a really strange man as he kept referring to himself in the third person i.e Arthur would do this, say that.
I was fortunate in knowing prior to today that he had been trying to keep his grace and favour union flat and was bitterly disappointed to learn that so him trying to use the right to buy system really does not surprise me.

If only all those miners who lost their jobs had had his bank balance.

[jezer]

Did he get rich on the back of the miners? I hope not, but I wouldn't be surprised if he did.

[blackbike]

I lived in an industrial part of Yorkshire before, during and for a time after the miners strike.

I knew a few miners and they seemed as capitalist as anyone else to me. They bought houses and nice cars, and went on expensive holidays using their relatively good wages.

[TonyR]

Don't his actions make more sense if he were a Thatcherite agent provocateur. If he wasn't in Mrs T's pay, he missed a trick doing all her dirty work buckshee

And TB was her chosen heir too

[reohn2]

I lived in an industrial part of Yorkshire before, during and for a time after the miners strike.

I knew a few miners and they seemed as capitalist as anyone else to me. They bought houses and nice cars, and went on expensive holidays using their relatively good wages.

Does that make them capitalists?

[NUKe]

I lived in an industrial part of Yorkshire before, during and for a time after the miners strike.

I knew a few miners and they seemed as capitalist as anyone else to me. They bought houses and nice cars, and went on expensive holidays using their relatively good wages.

,

Mining is a hard and dangerous Job, Don't you think they deserved to be rewarded for their contribution to the nations wealth?

[Ben@Forest]

I lived in an industrial part of Yorkshire before, during and for a time after the miners strike.

I knew a few miners and they seemed as capitalist as anyone else to me. They bought houses and nice cars, and went on expensive holidays using their relatively good wages.

Mining is a hard and dangerous Job, Don't you think they deserved to be rewarded for their contribution to the nations wealth?

I think the point is that most miners were 'as capitalist as anyone else', it's often the unionist firebrands that lead (or led) their members into actions that a good part of the membership really have (had) no truck with. Two members of my close family belong to a teaching union and they feel as disassociated with the union as they do with Michael Gove, but they belong because of the need for legal representation if required, which if they did need it would probably have nothing to do with politics. It's the same in the Police Federation, I imagine many police officers don't really have anything in common with their politicking but do want legal support when they need it.

[Si]

I'd always thought that the miners went on strike not because they had scheming plans of some glorious socialist revolution, but because they wanted to keep they jobs, and in turn keep their communities alive: the strike seemed to them the only option they had. Don't think that you need to be either socialist or capitalist to want to keep your job do you?
As for the people in charge....at least Thatch was true to her ideology however evil that ideology was. Scargill, I think, was just a power mad loon, who might have been true to socialism at one point but became enamoured of the Dark Side.

[Mike Sales]

I'd always thought that the miners went on strike not because they had scheming plans of some glorious socialist revolution, but because they wanted to keep they jobs, and in turn keep their communities alive: the strike seemed to them the only option they had. Don't think that you need to be either socialist or capitalist to want to keep your job do you?
As for the people in charge....at least Thatch was true to her ideology however evil that ideology was. Scargill, I think, was just a power mad loon, who might have been true to socialism at one point but became enamoured of the Dark Side.

We have just learned, via the release of cabinet papers, that Scargil was telling the truth about the pit closure programme, and Thatcher was lying. The Government said that the programme was limited to a few loss making pits, but now we know that Scargill was correct when he said that the real intention was to close many more. Subsequent closures showed that he was right: now we know that the deception was conscious.