huw beynon, andrew cox, ray hudson opencast coalmining and ... · ray hudson opencast coalmining...

Huw Beynon, Andrew Cox,Ray Hudson

Opencast coalminingand the politics of coalproduction

• In 1984, when the British coal-miners began theirstrike against colliery closures, they talked of their fear of a'hit list' of vulnerable pits and the prospects of large-scaleredundancies in the industry . The . President of the NUM,Arthur Scargill, talked repeatedly of such a hit list in two yearsthat led up to the strike, and of the prospect of 70,000 jobsbeing shed from an industry that was located predominantlyin areas of above-average unemployment. At that time therewas worry over what had been called the 'peripheral coalfields'in South Wales and Scotland and across the North of England .There was some worry too of the threat of coal imports and ofthe unfair competition from a domestic source in the form ofnuclear power .

In 1989 all of these fears seem understated rather thanexaggerated. In the wake of the miners' dispute the organis-ation of coal and energy in this country has been subjected toits greatest and most lasting transformation ; greater indeedthan that which accomplished nationalisation or that whichfollowed the importation of oil in the 1950s and 1960s andthe oil price increase in the early 1970s . Unlike those othergreat changes, however, the current shake-up has receivedremarkably little public attention . This is especially the case

Focusing on thegeneral picture, aswell as the specificchanges in theNortheast, theauthors considerthe ramificationsof an expandingopencast sector inBritish coalmining. Theydraw attention tothe intersectingpolitics of employ-ment and environ-ment and suggest 89that a basis foropposition cam-paigns may be con-structed .

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on the left of the political spectrum . Here it seems that (withthe miners' strike out of the way) attention can freely bedirected toward other more intriguing issues like post-Fordismand post-modernism . On the coalfields the post-strike periodhas been quite a traumatic one. And while news headlinesdraw attention to the occasional location of Japanese factoriesin South Wales, Scotland and the North East, the underlyingpattern of change has barely surfaced .

As such it's worth beginning with some statistics . InMarch 1983 there were 207,000 people working in the Britishcoal-mines . In March 1989, their number had been reducedto 87,79 1 . All best estimates anticipate a further reduction inthe current financial year, and few people expect there to bemore than 70,000 miners working in the industry by 1990 .In 1983, 191 collieries operated in the industry ; today just 93remain and up to twenty of those are immediately vulnerable .Across the coalfields the talk is of men being 'sick to deathwith the industry' and the way they have been treated . Sickto death too with the changes and the uncertainty .

What these changes add up to is in some ways quitesimple . With the abandonment of the Plan for Coal came theNew Strategy For Coal which replaced production targetswith financial ones. These targets have been used, alongsidethe international coal market, to increase pressure on BritishCoal's costs . This pressure has been enforced by the fact thatthe bulk of British Coal's product is sold to the ElectricitySupply Industry, and this is to be privatised, as has its othersignificant customer, British Steel . In these circumstances,and in a quest for 'low cost coal' . British Coal has closed downdeep mines . In the mines that remain open, new technologiesand working practices have been introduced at a rapid rate .These practices have been introduced unilaterally in manyinstances, and in spite of ideas of the UDM being a 'sweetheartunion', the Nottingham coal industry has been affected likeall the others . However, less attention has been paid to thefact that British Coal has (in a variety of - often surreptitious- ways) been pushing for the expansion of opencast mines .Given a fourth Thatcher government, there is every indicationthat the coal industry will be privatised, and in this contextthe private owners of the opencast coal companies talk of theirfuture as the new coal owners . This development is of somesignificance, and it is this on which we focus on in this paper .

Politics of coal production

The post-war coal industry in Britain developed under the The British coal 91umbrella of the 1946 Coal Nationalisation Act . This Act industry andvested all reserves of coal (with a few exceptions) with the opencast miningNational Coal Board, which was made the monopoly producerand distributor of coal in the UK . This monopoly was basedupon the fact that it produced around 200 million tonnes ofcoal in the 750 or so deep mines that densely packed thecoalfield districts . Within this arrangement opencast miningwas a decidedly minority activity . Opencast mining began ona significant scale in 1942 as a part of an emergency measurein wartime . In the post-war period, Britain was a single-fueleconomy and coal was in scarce supply . As such opencastmethods of extraction continued . The arrangements underwhich this mining took place were rather complicatedhowever . The opencast operators were not made a part of theNational Coal Board . Neither were the opencast workersrecruited by the National Union of Mineworkers . These factsemphasise the apparent temporary status of opencast miningat that time . To them can be added the legal regulations whichsurrounded opencast methods of extraction . The main open-cast sites were organised under a licensing arrangement withthe NCB . This eventually became co-ordinated by the NCB'sOpencast Executive. Civil engineering companies would ten-der for contracts to mine identified opencast sites, the coalfrom which would be delivered, at an agreed price, to the CoalBoard. In addition, other smaller opencast sites and driftmines were allowed to produce and sell coal, under licencefrom the NCB and in return for a tonnage royalty .

The size of these sites and mines (in terms of tonnage andworkers employed) was regulated by Act of Parliament . Thusat the fringes of the NCB, a private system of productioncontinued, largely dependent upon the nationalised industry .These arrangements were solidified in 1957 through a specialAct of Parliament which dealt with the opencast sector, andin substance they carried the industry through the next twentyyears .

Basic to the industry was an understanding of thesubordinate and marginal role of the private sector . In 1959,when the threat of oil imports had become clear, official policyaimed at phasing out the opencast sector in spite of its peakperformance of the previous year . That it was saved from nearextinction owed much to the support of Alf Robens . As MP

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for Blyth he had direct experience of opencast mining on hisdoorstep in Northumberland, and he became a powerfuladvocate in the House of Commons. He carried this advocacyforward as Chairman of the Coal Board . In his advocacy ofopencast mining Robens had an eye to a profitable area ofproduction within the Boards operations . While output wascut in the 1960s it (like the deep mines) was also rationalisedand the sector organised on a more competitive basis . Thesechanges were allied with technological improvements in dig-ging and transportation . In this way opencast output increasedincrementally towards the end of the sixties - 6.17 milliontonnes coming off the sites in 1967 and 10 million in 1973 .Thus, on the eve of Plan for Coal, the Opencast Executive ofthe Coal Board felt in a strong position to push for an increasein the tonnage from the private sector . Here, of course, it waspushing at an open door .

The 1974 Plan for Coal was a blithely optimisticdocument, which argued (with little evidence) that the retreatmade by coal in the 1960s would turn into an advance whichwould carry the industry towards the end of the century whencoal output would match the levels of the 1950s . Specificallyit was proposed that output should be increased from 110million tonnes to 135 million tonnes by 1985 . As part of thisgeneral increase opencast output was planned to rise from 10to 15 million tonnes. Here it was assumed that demand forcoal would increase as part of a general movement away fromoil . It is not just how the figures for opencast and deep-minedtonnages were arrived at that gave cause for concern . Therewas some apprehension over the possibility of the deep minesincreasing output at such speed, opencast mining being moreadaptable in the short term. But this was no more than ageneral feeling . Specifically the figures came out of an ad hocarrangement within the tripartite committee that producedthe Plan and many analysts now see it as little more than a'back of an envelope' calculation (Prior and McCloskey, 1988 :57) . It was a calculation which was to have its significance .It was one which was based upon a growing strength andconfidence within the Open Cast Executive, and which cameat a time when civil engineering companies were geared up tothe task of earning profits in coal-mining . In this sense thePlan For Coal's assessment of the supply potential of theprivate sector (back of the envelope or not) was correct . It was

potentially the most accurate part of the whole plan . Certainlyits assessment of likely market developments were far fromaccurate . Tables 1 and 2 reveal these trends clearly .


Table 1 : Total UK inland consumption of primary fuels for energy use (percentage share)

(million tonnes coal equivalent)

Source: UK Digest of Energy Statistics (Department of Energy) .

Table 2 : UK coal markets 1955-88

Source: Digest of UK Energy Statistics .

Strike affected year.

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(Million tonnes)

1955 1965 1975 1985' 1988

Power stations 44.0 71 .1 73 .4 73.9 82.5

Coke ovensManufactured fuels andgas works 57.0 47.7 23.2 13.2 12.9

Domestic (house coaland other solid fuels) 39.0 28.8 11 .6 8.6 6 .6

Industrial, commercialand other consumers 76.9 37.0 14.0 9.7 9 .5

Total 216.9 184.6 122.2 105 .4 111 .5

Primary fuel 1955 1965 1975 1980 1985 1987

Coal 85.4 61 .8 36.9 36.9 32.2 34 .4Petroleum 14 .2 35.0 42 .0 37.0 35.2 32 .3Natural gas - 17 .1 21 .4 25.2 25 .4Nuclear/Hydro-

electric0.4 2 .7 4 .0 4.7 7 .4 7.9

Total energy 253.9 303.3 324.8 328.0 326.9 338 .1

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94 In the 1970s, output increased, but only opencast coaloutput kept pace with the Plan For Coal estimates. Despiteclear signs that the market assumptions behind the plan werewrong, the 15 million tonnes a year target remained . Theoverall target was broken down into detailed regional targetswhich were used by the Opencast Executive to justify theopening of new sites . Local environmental planners found suchtargets (in state documents) compelling support and gave theserequests a sympathetic hearing . With such support the privatesector reached the 15 million target in 1980 - five years aheadof time . It maintained those levels through the 1980s and hasrecently exceeded them . As a result it has also stronglyincreased its share of UK coal production . In 1980 opencastproduction represented 12 % of the total UK coal output. By1988 this had increased to 17 .9 million tonnes - over 17of total output (see Table 3) . As its significance as a producerwas increased, so too has the private sector emerged as apowerful political force within the industry. In the context ofdebate over the privatisation of the Electricity Supply Industryand the coal industry, private coal companies now have asignificant voice . As they push for a more central role in theindustry so too have they pressured government over thestatutory limitations placed upon their activities . Within thenewly-formed British Coal, opencast mining is recognised tohave a completely changed role. It was described by thecompany's marketing director, Malcolm Edwards, as one ofthe two main assets of the company - the other being the Five-Year agreement with the CEGB . This statement makes clearthe growing reality within the coal industry - squeezed intoa duopolistic arrangement with the Esi ; pressed by theavailability of cheap coal on the international market ; increas-ingly reliant upon supplies of coal from its own private sector .How have these factors come together?

Government The present Government's energy policy was outlined in 1982Policy and the by the then Secretary of State for Energy, Mr Nigel Lawson,coal industry

in a speech to the Fourth Annual Conference of the Internatio-nal Association of Energy Economists at Churchill College,Cambridge . As he put it,

' . . . I do not see the Government's task as being to tryand plan the future share of energy production and

consumption . It is not even primarily to try and balanceUK demand and supply for energy . Our task is rather toset a framework which will ensure that the marketoperates in the energy sector with a minimum of distor-tion and that energy is produced and consumed effi-ciently' . . .

. . . there is something even more fundamental . This isto recognise, as Governments have not always done in thepast, that for the most part energy is a traded good' .

More recently it has become apparent that the Govern-ment has adopted a different agenda, forcing the coal industryto adopt differing goals from other energy industries (mostnotably the nuclear power sector) .

Since the 1984/5 NUM strike, British Coal has been forcedto work within tight financial limits set by Government . Themost recent corporate planning document of British Coal (thesuccessor to Plan for Coal) New Strategy For Coal, outlinesthe intended future for the coal industry . Its main goals are :

1 . To phase out the industry's dependence on subsidyand to break even by the end of the decade .2. To achieve conditions in which the industry could sellcoal at competitive prices . To this end the industry wouldabandon any fixed production targets (as was the caseunder Plan for Coal) and adopt a more flexible approachto meeting market requirements .

To achieve these aims British Coal decided to maximiseoutput at low cost collieries and opencast sites as a means ofreducing average costs. £1 .50/GJ (gigajoule) was set as theproduction target for all collieries, with opencast sites havingto produce coal at 1/GJ . It appears that British Coal has a firmcommitment to keep to these cost targets, allowing inflationto move the real level downward slightly each year .

The Coal Board's defence of the new strategy is basedupon the argument that costs need to be dramatically cut inorder to compete with cheap coal imports . As such, it talksof critical cost barriers at £1 .65/GJ ; £1 .50/GJ and £1 .00/GJ,and argues that

'it is most unlikely that any colliery constantly producingat an operating cost in excess of £1 .65/GJ could make aneconomic contribution even if supply and demand are in


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96 Table 3: UK coal production (million tonnes)

Sources: UK Mineral Statistics and Energy Trends .(1) Coal recovered from tips, etc .(2) Strike Affected Years .

Year Deep-mined Opencast Other(1) Total Opencastas % of

total output

1942 206.9 1 .3 - 108 .2 0.61943 197.6 4.6 202 .2 2.31944 187.1 8.8 - 195 .9 4.51945 177.5 8.2 - 185 .7 4.41946 184.2 8.9 - 193 .1 4.61947 190.2 10.5 - 200 .7 5.21948 200.8 12 .0 121 .8 5.61949 205.9 12 .7 - 218 .6 5.81950 207.4 12 .1 - 219 .5 5.51951 214.7 11 .0 0.5 226 .2 4.91952 216.1 12 .1 0.3 228 .5 5.31953 215.2 11 .7 0.2 227 .1 5.11954 217 .0 10.2 0.2 227 .4 4.51955 213.3 11 .5 0.5 225 .6 5.11956 213.3 12 .3 0.5 226 .1 5.41957 213.4 13.8 0.6 227 .8 6.01958 204 .7 14 .6 0.5 219 .8 6.61959 198.4 11 .0 0.7 210 .1 5.21960 189.0 7 .7 1 .1 197 .8 3.91961 184 .8 8 .7 1 .5 195 .0 4.51962 192 .4 8 .2 2.0 202 .6 4.01963 192 .7 6 .2 1 .5 200 .4 3.11964 189 .8 6 .9 1 .3 198 .0 3.51965 183 .1 7 .5 1 .1 191 .6 3.91966 170 .2 7 .1 1 .5 178.9 4.01967 167 .7 7 .2 2.7 177.6 4.11968 159 .7 7 .0 3.2 169.9 4.11969 146 .6 6 .4 2 .7 155.7 4.11970 136 .7 7 .9 2 .5 147.1 5.41971 136 .5 10 .6 2 .3 149.4 7 .11972 109 .1 10 .4 2 .3 121 .8 8.51973 120 .0 10 .1 1 .8 132.0 7 .61974 100 .0 9 .3 1 .2 110.5 8.41975 117 .4 10 .4 0.9 128.7 8.11976 110 .3 11 .9 1 .6 123.8 9.61977 107 .1 13 .5 1 .5 122.1 11 .11978 107 .5 14 .2 1 .9 123.6 10 .51979 107 .8 12 .9 1 .7 122.4 10 .51980 112 .4 15 .8 1 .9 130.1 12 .11981 110 .5 14 .8 2 .2 127.5 11 .61982 106 .2 15 .3 3.2 124.7 12 .31983 101 .7 14 .7 2 .8 119.2 12 .31984 35 .2 14 .3 1 .7 51 .2 27 .9(2)1985 75 .2 15 .6 3 .2 94.0 16.6(2)1986 90 .4 14 .3 3 .4 108.1 13 .21987 85 .8 15 .8 2 .8 104.4 15 .11988 83 .5 17 .9 2 .4 103.8 17 .2

balance . In the short run we would regard this as anabsolute limit of acceptable costs . . . indeed in duecourse we shall need to aim at costs of no more than£1 .50/GJ at our long life pits . Because the UK market islikely to be contained for some years ahead . . . anyadditional production must be low enough in cost tojustify additional exports at prices of about £1 .OOGJ .'

In pushing these policies the strategy argues that

'We need to maximise output in our low-cost collieriesand opencast sites as a means of reducing average costs .'

This appeared in the evidence to the Select Committee as theneed to

'develop new and replacement capacity and new opencastoutput with sufficiently low costs to be competitive'(House of Commons Select Committee on Energy, 1987) .

In this process established requirements relating to theenvironment are simply dispensed with under the pressinglyurgent language of costs, and cost-cutting. We read of the'vital economic importance of opencast as a source of low costcoal'. And of how :

'British Coal considers that in order to pursue thesepolicies effectively they (sic) will need to maintain open-cast output at 14m tonnes p .a . . . . with the possibleexpansion up to 18m tonnes p.a . subject to availabilityof low cost sites .'

To this, the 'National Assessment' adds the rider whichis in keeping with the market orientated approach of thedocument . This, it says, 'would not be regarded as an absoluteupper limit' . The near religious zeal of the document reflectsa view that opencast mining has a crucial role .

'it keeps out imports, with which it can compete on costgrounds, and in doing so provides employment in the UK

which would otherwise be transferred to suppliersabroad' .

Without opencast output

'we would lose employment in both areas, imports wouldrise and the balance of payments and security of domestic


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energy supply would suffer' (British Coal OpencastExecutive, 1986) .

The tone of the document is itself very revealing ; evendisturbing . It implies that anyone opposed to these develop-ments must be unhinged or ill-intentioned . Certainly indealing with Coal Board representatives in those years it wasdifficult not to feel the sense of ideological fervour whichgripped them . Certainly in the pursuit of these objectives theyhave been successful . In its most recent report on the industrythe Monopoly and Mergers Commission (1989) described itsperformance as 'impressive by any standards'. Since 1982-3face output has increased by 94 % and output per man shiftby 85 76 . High cost collieries have closed, and new heavy-dutyfaces have been established in the ones that remain . In thesemanning levels have been reduced . In the deep mines andopencast sites costs have been cut dramatically (see Table 4) .Still opencast coal appears to have a cost advantage . And stillthe squeeze continues . In Scotland where the opencast sitesand deep mines are run by the same management there is areal possibility of the deep-mined production ceasing . For inspite of all these changes ('impressive by any standards')British Coal is still in the red . Yet again it will not break even .

Table 4 : Cost of production 1987/8 deep-mined and opencast coal

Source: British Coal Annual Report and Accounts 1987/8 .

Deep mining areas Cost of production Opencast area Cost of production(£/GJ) (£/GJ)

Scottish 2.53 North East 1 .04North East 1 .48 North West 1 .30North Yorkshire 1.60 Central West 0.67South Yorkshire 1 .62 Central East 1 .14Nottinghamshire 1.49 South West 1 .30Central 1.60 Scottish 1 .02Western 1.64South Wales 2.31 Total 1 .03Kent 2.43

Total 1 .65

Equally, electricity privatisation will almost certainlycause further serious retrenchment at British Coal. The mostvulnerable deep-mine area is the North East which sends alarge proportion of its production to the Thames powerstations. At the February 1989 meeting of the CoalfieldCommunities Campaign it was forecast that by 1991/2 onlyone or two pits could be left in the North East, even thoughit has the cheapest deep-mine production in the UK (Samuel-son, 1989a) . These remarks echoed forecasts made ten yearsearlier and which then were dismissed as extremely alarmist .North East coal will quickly be displaced by imports .Moreover, recent proposals to build large new coal importingfacilities around the UK (most notably at North and SouthKillingholme on the Humber) could further eat into the heartof British Coal's market .

The Energy Minister, Mr Michael Spicer, recently restatedthe Government's view that, after privatisation, generatingcompanies would be free to buy the cheapest fuel on themarket, arguing that any additional imports would applymore pressure on British Coal to increase efficiency andbecome more competitive (Mason and Samuelson, 1989) .More recently in the House of Commons, Cecil Parkinson,Energy Secretary, expressed the view that British Coal neededto break even, and argued that the corporation should increasethe rate in which it 'shed unprofitable businesses in non coalmarkets', while continuing the process of 'restructuring itsoperations' (Samuelson, 1989b) . In this context opencast coalsexpansion is justified repeatedly as a means of keeping outimports .

And in line with these changes the Government has been The planninginvolved in a process of altering the planning regulations systemwhich relate to the coal industry. A White Paper, presentedto parliament in May 1983 has still to appear as an Act .Instead a Circular (3/84) was issued by the Department of theEnvironment . This circular established a set of 'transitionalarrangements' which would be in force in advance of theimpending act . The White Paper and the circular rested, inpart, on the findings of the Royal Commission on Coal andthe Environment, which were published in 1981 . The FlowersCommission had recommended that the future of opencast


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mining be linked to the future of the deep mines and,

'as older, more unprofitable and less environmentallyacceptable mines are closed . . . the volume of opencastmining should be allowed to decline' (Flowers Report,1981 : 8-9) .

Understandably, this conclusion caused some problems for theGovernment. Nevertheless the Commission did talk of open-cast production being justified in the context of a specific needfor the type of coal to be found on the site . It referred, forexample, to a 'demonstrable need for a certain grade of cokingcoal' or if there was a 'need to fulfill short term increases indemand'. In a highly significant Public Inquiry into theOpencast Executive's Woodhead Site in the Derwent Valleyin the North East of England, the Inspector wrote of environ-mentally damaging opencast production being justified onlyin the face of 'strong', 'certain' and 'urgent' needs . Ratherambiguously, perhaps, Circular 3/84 picked up these themes .It referred to the special need for

'particular types of coals such as anthracite and primequality coking coals which are in short supply in theUnited Kingdom' .

Most significantly it recommended, in paragraph 15, that'each project should be considered in terms of the marketrequirement for its planned output (taking into account thealternative sources of supply including deep mined coal)' . Thisparagraph - on 'market requirements' - sat alongside theCircular's references to the 'need' for coal and to the import-ance of filtering planning applications through a 'broad sieve' .

Here then we see a transformation in markets (increasinginternational competition ; increasing dependence upon elec-tricity generation) affecting both sectors of coal supply . Wealso see the state regulation of supply through the operationof the planning system and the financial regulation of BritishCoal. These combinations of factors often led to intensefrustration felt by each of the separate interests involved in theregulation and development of coal production . Private oper-ators have frequently refused to provide mineral planningauthorities at the application stage with evidence of the typeof coal or the details of the market it will supply . British Coal,for so long the monopoly producer, has tended to take the

view that it is the best judge of its interests . In a recent PublicInquiry, for example, the head of the North East Area of theOpencast Executive expressed the view that 'the marketrequirement for various types, grades and qualities of coal isknown pre-eminently to the Board' .

The successor to Circular 3/84, Mineral Planning GuidanceNote No . 3 (MPG 3) on 'Opencast Coal Mining' (Departmentof Environment/Welsh Office, 1988) was published in June1988 ; and this is altogether a clearer and more direct docu-ment than its predecessor . Here there is a clear shift from thelanguage of Flowers, and an abandonment of any notion ofneed (with all the metaphysical and relativistic problems thatword contains). Instead the language is one of costs andmarkets. It makes clear that :

and

'because opencast coal is one of the cheapest forms ofenergy available to this country, it is in the nationalinterest to maximise production where that can be donein an environmentally acceptable way' (para . 5) .

'there is a strong case in the national interest for allowingthese resources to be developed unless there are overridingenvironmental considerations (para . 6) .

The 'need' for coal is now determined to exist in advanceas a matter of policy, without reference to the justification ofthe need on a site by site basis . Furthermore, the documentmakes clear that 'opencast is not in competition with deepmined coal' (para. 3), thereby establishing clearly the para-meters within which local planning authorities should maketheir decisions. Under 3/84 opposition to opencast sites hadbeen based strongly upon the idea of 'need' and the linked ideaof competition with the deep mines - opencast coal, it wasargued, isn't needed, sufficient supplies are available in deepmines which will be closed should opencast production con-tinue . Such agreements won some support from Inspectors atPublic Inquiries . MPG3 made them much less potent .

The implications of these changes, taken together, are wide The public -ranging and significant . Cumulatively they can be seen to private divideinvolve the detailed impact of market forces, and the interests


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of private capital, with the complex of social relationships thathas made up the coal industry (and the coal regions) since1945 . They are changes of some substance therefore . Nowhereis this more clear perhaps than in the perceptible emergenceof a private coal interest in the coalfields, for as British Coalpressed for the development and expansion of the opencastoperations under its control, so too have contractors operatingin the private licensed sector pushed for an extension of theiroperations through a relaxation in the statutory regulation ofthe independent sector . Their evidence to both the Monopoliesand Mergers Commission and the Select Committee has laidgreat stress on the efficiency and viability of the privateoperations and the need for a greater scope (through a liftingof the tonnage limit) and freedom (a reduction or removal onthe royalty payment to British Coal) for their operations . Theircase resonates with the White Paper 'Lifting the Burden' andfound some sympathy in Circular 14/85 from the Departmentof the Environment which urged the planning system tosupport developments unless they cause 'demonstrable harm' .

Table 5: Opencast production statistics 1983/4 - 1987/8 (100 tonnes)

Source: County Planning Officers' Society, 1988 .

The private opencast sector has been strenuously lobbyingGovernment over the past few years to remove or relax thelegal restrictions placed on its activities . The output of privatesites is restricted to 25,000 tonnes or thereabouts (which, withextensions, means in practice a production limit of 50,000tonnes) . Licensed opencast sites also pay a royalty of £13 .50per tonne to British Coal .

Production figures for both British Coal Opencast Execu-tive and Licensed Sites (for the years 1983/4 - 1987/8) areshown in Table 5 . Licensed output can be seen to be steadily

Year Opencast executive sites Licensed sites Total production

1983/4 13,833 966 14,7991984/5 13,660 1,238 14,8981985/6 13,867 1,396 15,2631986/7 12,813 1,783 14,5961987/8 14,461 1,838 16,299

increasing, and this will be escalated by the recent announce-ment to seek to increase the legal tonnage from such sites to250,000 tonnes . This increase has been achieved by a persis-tent and effective political lobby .

The parliamentary group in support of opencast includesthe Conservative MP's Marcus Fox, Peter Rost and MichaelFallon . They are part of a powerful new grouping whose linksextend throughout the coal industry . Its growing influencewas also indicated when Mr Robert Young (Chairman ofYoung Group plc, private operators and contractors) becamea freeman of the City of London (sponsored by Mr IanMacGregor, former Chairman of British Coal) .

The impact of the changes hinted at here can be clearlyseen in a number of ways, and perhaps most clearly in an arealike the North East . This area has an extensive exposedcoalfield, and is one of the places where independent licensedoperations have been most prominent . In this respect the areaisn't typical, but it focuses attention upon trends which areemerging on a national scale . For example, nationally and inthe North East, recent years have seen a clear shift in thebalance of coal output .

Nationally, deep-mined output remains dominant,though it has fallen from 105 million tonnes in 1981/2 to 82mt in 1987/8 while opencast output has risen from 15 .4 mtto 17.2 mt (of which the licensed operators production hasrisen from 1 . 1 to 2 . 1 mt) . While locally in the North Eastthe deep mines (with 10 million tonnes output p.a .) are stillclearly dominant, their output has declined substantially fromthe 14 .5 million tonnes of 1981/2 . In contrast opencast outputstabilised around 3 million tonnes and has been recentlyexpanded . Its share of total tonnage has increased from a sixthto a quarter in this period . This pattern has not been even . InCounty Durham, in contrast to the national pattern, there hasbeen a gradual expansion of opencast output but a decline inoutput from Opencast Executive sites . In 1987-8 productionstatistics indicate that output from the private licensed sites(at over 400,000 tonnes) provided over a third of opencasttonnage in the county (County Planning Officers' Society,1988) .

There is also an increasing tendency for private companiesto be operating in both sectors of opencast mining . Mostlythey originate within road haulage or the civil engineering


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industry but they are increasingly being constituted as a groupof private coal producers . In this there are a number of smallindependent operators (e .g . Banks, Budge, Young Group, inthe North East) and another group based on conglomeratesand major companies like Burnett and Hallamshire (nowrenamed NSM, following a recent restructuring) .

Some idea of these changes can be seen in the history ofRyan International, originally a Cardiff-based coal recoveryfirm . The company was hauled back from receivership in 1985by a group of investors led by Mr Christian Hotson . In 1986it bought up the Derek Crouch Group of Companies for£28m . Crouch had a history of contracts with the OpencastExecutive and own the famed 'Big Geordie' dragline inNorthumberland . The new company established through thismerger had an annual coal output of 2 .75 million tonnes . Atthe time of the merger Mr Hotson remarked that it wouldincrease the company's standing in the coal industry andprotect it from changes in the political scene . He added, 'Youneed size and strength to negotiate in an industry dominatedby two monopolies like the CEGB and British Coal' (Talt,1989). Further plans to merge Ryan with the Carless oil groupin 1988 to create a broadly-based energy conglomerate withassets of £267 million foundered when Carless was the subjectof a takeover bid from the Kelt oil company . At the beginningof 1989 Ryan's history took a further turn with the companybeing the subject of a £69 .6m management buy-out by a newcompany called Digger .

The significance of this private coal interest upon thepatterning of the public/private divide can be seen in a numberof ways. Most notable perhaps is the movement of personnelbetween the sectors . The statutory requirement for collierymanagers to be certificated has meant that the managementof licensed drift mines is dominated by ex-managers of theNCB . As such, in 1986 Mr Michael Eaton, the Coal Board'sspokesman during the miners' strike, headed a buy-out teamwhich purchased four private anthracite drift mines in SouthWales (The Times, 4.12 .86) .

Equally prolific are the numbers of planners, surveyorsand geologists who have moved from local government, theMinistry of Agriculture, Food and Fisheries (MAFF) and BritishCoal to work for the opencast operators . This is a nationalphenomenon, but it is most developed in the North East .


There, eight members of County Durham's planning staff havetaken employment in the private coal sector in the past six

years . We have interviewed some of these, and were informedgraphically of their need to go 'the way of all flesh' . Thefinancial inducements were just too attractive to stay with thelocal authority . We also talked to some of the people whostayed, and we've heard of the deterioration of morale in theplanning profession . Where planning appeals have been heard,it has often been the case that the private sector knew the localauthorities prepared arguments better than the County Coun-cil. 'We've had a number of cases where the chap who'sputting up the case for the private operator is the same personwho prepared our case rejecting their application in the first

place' .

The change in the pattern of coal supplies has also had its The labour forceeffect upon the composition of the coal industry labour force .The partial break in the monopoly of British Coal has beenmost pronounced in the case of the NUM . At the moment thedeep-mine workforce is divided between the NUM and theUDM. In this context the presence of non-NUM members onopencast sites and in licensed drift mines, adds a furthercomplicating factor to the organisation of labour in the BritishCoal industry. An example of this development was seen inthe (perhaps mischievous) suggestion by the Regional Secre-tary of the TGwu in South Wales to the effect that his unionwould organise the (perhaps mischievously) proposed newmine at Margam if the NUM would not agree to a new workingweek agreement. It now appears that the UDM will take overthis role if the pit is ever sunk . George Wright's involvementin the coal industry comes through his union's recruitment ofworkers in the opencast sites in South Wales . As a consequenceof this the TGwu has become a solid supporter of opencastsites, in contrast to the opposition of the NUM . These differingviews were the subject of considerable discussion in 1989 whenit seemed possible that the two unions would merge . In SouthWales, the opencast sites are highly unionised ; in other areasthey are less so . On some sites labour only subcontracting (thelump) has become established, along with non-unionism . Acomplex coal industry labour force emerges from this account,as part of a trend which can be expected to continue into the

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Table 6: Employment in deep mining in three peripheral coalfields

1990s . It is in stark contrast to their established image of thetraditional miner', with powerfully linked ideologies of classand community . Opencast sites are of relatively short dur-ation, and involve workers in fixed contracts which are, forsome, renewed with the next site . It is a pattern of short-termmining, therefore, with a less sustained relationship withparticular communities .

Frequently opencast contractors and private operatorspromise to employ local residents on new sites (often as a wayof pacifying opposition to a planning application). However,the companies usually move their existing staff to the new site

North East area

Year No. of deep mines Manpower Deep mine output

1983/4 16 22,900

(1,000 tonnes)

10,9851984/5 15 Strike affected1985/6 10 17,900 9,5821986/7 8 14,400 10,2291987/8 7 11,800 10,255

South Wales

Year

1983/41984/51985/61986/71987/8

No. of deep mines

2828171411

Manpower

20,100Strike affected

13,50010,2007,500

Deep mine output(1,000 tonnes)

6,606

6,6386,4795,027

Scotland

Year No. of deep mines Manpower Deep mine output

1983/4 9 13,100(1,000 tonnes)

5,3231984/5 9 Strike affected1985/6 9 7,700 4,2761986/7 6 4,500 3,4421987/8 4 3,500 2,603

and the few local people who are fortunate to be offeredemployment usually fill vacancies for unskilled and low-paidjobs .

The opencast employment scene is paralleled to somedegree by the increasing proportion of deep miners who haveto travel from their 'home communities', where the pits haveclosed, to employment at a pit in another part of the coalfield .Generally, as we have seen, employment underground hasdeclined dramatically . In the North East, deep-mine employ-ment has more than halved during the last five years . In SouthWales there are now less than 7,000 men in the industry whilethe Scottish area has been reduced to three deep mines andunder 3,000 men . Table 6 summarises the changes that havetaken place in these 'peripheral' coalfields .

We have noted the changes in the deep mines (in relationto work force, flexibility, redundancies, etc .) and pointed tothe ways in which these are linked to developments in theopencast sector . Here the labour process is much less complex,involving less fixed capital equipment and also less skilledlabour. In the region (the North East) where British Coalachieves its highest productivity the 3 million tonnes ofopencast coal is produced by about 1,250 opencast workers,yet the 10 million tonnes of deep-mined coal is based upon adeep-mine labour force of 11,600. It is this 'employmenteffect' of a shift from deep-mined to opencast mining whichhas worried local authorities and was prominent in theevidence presented by the Coalfield Communities Campaignto the Select Committee on Energy (House of Commons,1987). The concern hinges upon the employment and incomemultiplier effects generated by deep-mined production incontrast with opencast mining . This view has been expressedat a number of Public Inquiries and several inspectors haveseen it to be a source of legitimate concern for local authoritiesworried by high local unemployment . In her Report followingthe Barcus Close Opencast Inquiry, Co. Durham (1984) theInspector concluded that

. . . Production of coal from deep mines is much morelabour-intensive than opencast mining, and this is a veryimportant consideration in this area, which has lost somany mining and industrial jobs over the past few years .The (Co. Durham) Structure Plan records the limitedpercentage of the national workforce now employed in


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industry, and the retention of such employment in an areatraditionally heavily reliant on this sector of the economyis very relevant' (Barcus Close Inquiry, 1984) .

A growing body of empirical evidence exists on theimpact on local labour markets of deep mines closures, mostnotably the study Undermining Easington (Hudson, Peck andSadler, 1986) . While similar detailed studies haven't beenundertaken in relation to the jobs in opencast mining and theoverall impact of a shift in the balance of coal supply, it seemsreasonable to suggest that the opencast coal supply is basedupon a smaller, less skilled labour force, with a less stableregional base, and less developed employment linkages intoother branches of local industry . Also in some regions thereseems to be a spatial separation between the operations of thedeep mines and the opencast sites (e .g. in parts of the NorthEast), while in others (e.g . South Wales) opencast sites anddeep mines are worked alongside each other . The implicationsof these variations (in terms of work-force co-operation,solidarity, etc .) are, as yet, unclear . What is clear is that theoverall composition of the mine labour force in Britain is beingtransformed . The implications of this - for the operation ofthe industry and the politics of the coal districts - arepotentially far reaching .

Policy

Opencast mining is recognised as having an environmentallyimplications and

damaging impact, although the scale of this is disputed bythe environment the Opencast Executive . The ongoing environmental costs of

opencast mining also include noise and dust, plus the presenceof heavy plant and haulage wagons on roads . Certainly theoperation of an opencast site leads to an immediate loss ofamenity value (loss of trees and original vegetation, hedges,wildlife, farm buildings and other surface features) .

John Atkinson (former Land Commissioner for MAFF inthe North East Region with responsibility for all NCB opencastrestoration) thought that restoration (after opencast coalextraction) was a much abused word (Atkinson, 1986) . Hethought that it was nothing more than a salvage operationwith the objective of mitigating, as far as possible, theenormous loss to the landscape, the diminution of soilproductivity and the immeasurable loss to plant and wildlifeand the natural environment. Mr Atkinson also added that if

restoration is not supervised properly the results will be a'cosmetic confidence trick' . He concluded that such tricks havebeen played in the past and that restoration of any site canonly be as good as the supervision it receives .

The subject of restoration was ably discussed in theInspector's Report following the Ellerbeck West OpencastInquiry, in Lancashire (Ellerbeck West Inquiry, 1989). Hethought that

. . . common sense insists that the restored landscapewould for many years appear 'man made', more or lessdevoid of the countless natural features and eccentricitieswhich are part and parcel of its present charm and resultfrom the passage of time rather than man's artifice . Intime, another landscape would begin to mature, but Iconsider that it would be very many years before thisassumed an interest and sense of naturalness akin to thatof the site's landscape' .

Recent British Coal financial statistics show that site restora-tion accounts for only 2 .6% of total opencast costs (BritishCoal, 1988) .

During 1988 several doctors in Glynneath in the Vale ofNeath, in South Wales, produced a report linking high levelsof illness in their community with the dust from opencast coalmines (See Watson et al., 1986; Jones, 1988 ; and The Times,5 .2 .89) . The doctors' carried out a two-year investigationamong the 7,000 people served by the health practice afterhigh prescription costs had been challenged by the WelshOffice. The report established that a high level of asthmaattacks occurred when the wind was blowing from theopencast site and that ear infections, which in many casesaffected different people, tended to follow after a short timelag .

The doctors had earlier expressed their fears for the localresidents health at the Brynhenllys Opencast Inquiry . BritishCoal attempted to belittle their concern and accuse them ofbeing 'anti-working class' because they expressed concern forthe health of their patients .

After lengthy considerations of evidence by the Glynneathdoctors to the Derllwyn Opencast Inquiry (during 1988) theWelsh Office has issued an unprecedented order to reopen theInquiry (with a medical assessor) to consider further medical


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evidence. This re-opened Inquiry is still on-going . There isgrowing interest throughout the country in this issue withfurther detailed research being proposed .

Where derelict land exists, these sites can be seen to havea positive reclaiming impact . Such land is, however, decliningrapidly on the exposed coalfields. In Scotland, in the NorthEast and the North West of England, few applications inrecent years for large or small sites have involved derelict land .Opencast operations are slowly moving onto land of higheragricultural potential and into areas of greater environmentalsensitivity . This is likely to lead to increasing opposition tothe expansion of this kind of mining .

The MAFF has tended to occupy a neutral position in mostareas of dispute . In this it recognises the damaging impact ofstrip mining, but also the economic interests of many farmersfor whom 'coal is the best crop' .

Environmental pressure groups such as the Council forthe Protection of Rural England (cPRE) draw upon traditionalsupport in the countryside areas which is often politicallyconservative . To such groups are linked 'local residents', whosesocial composition is far from even . New arrivals, oftenprofessional and managerial couples are usually in the forefrontof action committees . Occasionally such opposition is sup-ported by local business interests or development corporations .

In the old coalfield districts considerable care has beentaken by planning authorities with their 'image' in relation toprospective new employers . Coal, with its connotations of dirtand grime - of old industry and the past - has beendownvalued within this and a strong emphasis has been givento cleanliness and an ordered environment . Within thesedistricts, therefore, there have been occasional signs of thesupporters of 'economic' activity siding with 'environmental-ists' against opencast coal mining. The politics of this are oftenconvoluted, however, as local industrial development organ-isations seek to promote an 'enterprise culture' that seeksstrongly to dissociate itself from the old collectivist culture ofthe coalfields, which some opponents of opencast seek todefend . Such has been the case of the Derwentside IndustrialDevelopment Agency which have presented evidence to severalPublic Inquiries opposing opencast activity (most recently atthe Rose Hills Public Inquiry, Co . Durham during 1986) .

In this paper we have been concerned to comment on thevariety of ways in which changes are taking place in the Britishcoal industry focusing upon the increasing significance givento opencast production nationally . While these changes havebeen expressed in terms of a dramatic increase in efficiency andcompetitiveness of the industry such an emphasis fails toexamine the costs and long-term consequences of thesechanges . Those can be viewed in terms of the loss of jobopportunities in the established coal-mining districts of thecountry . In parts of Scotland, South Wales, the North Eastand South West Yorkshire and Nottingham increases inproductivity have to be counterposed with accounts of heighten-ing levels of unemployment and deprivation .

However, it is clear that the British coal industry willnever again employ large numbers of miners and realisticprojections need to recognise this. Equally, it seems inevitablethat the political squeeze exacted by this government on theindustry will continue up until the next election . Should theTories be returned again, the industry will be privatised, andby that time the deep-mined sector will have been contractedeven further than it is today . Equally it seems clear that theopencast sector will thrive, and that within it quite powerfulprivate coal interests will emerge . The general impact of thosechanges upon the coalfield districts (strongly documented asLabourist and solidaristic) needs to be considered .

In making a judgement on the future of deep mines it ishelpful to return to the writings of Ian MacGregor . In hisbook The Enemies Within, he makes clear the way he seeschanges developing in the industry . Here he talks of 'thechange from a labour intensive to a capital intensive economy'as being inevitable, and a force which 'no politician or unionboss' can make disappear . His role, he recognised as being oneof managing the change 'of being a sort of midwife to it'(MacGregor, 1986) . In this respect MacGregor was quite clearseeing. Mining will be an increasingly capital intensiveindustry. Modern faces produce as much coal as was, justrecently, produced by efficient collieries . Superpits now pro-duced greater tonnage with a half of the labour force theyemployed in the early 1980s, and it is likely that this trendwill continue apace .

In another respect MacGregor's vision was rather dis-torted however. In all capital intensive systems the compliance


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of the workforce is critical . As the 1978 Ridley Report madeclear with respect to the electricity supply industry, the newright Tories seemed to recognise this in advocating buying offpotential opposition with above-average wage rises . The Gov-ernment remains sensitive to this issue in relation to the powerstations but not the coalmines . And here we have one of theunanswered questions in relation to British mining in the1990s. At the end of the strike MacGregor announced 'Peopleare now discovering the price of insubordination and boy arewe going to make it stick' . Miners still remember this. Whenmarket forces change, and when ownership alters, they mayput that memory to use .

But, as we have made clear throughout this paper, themodern coal industry is more complex than the industry ofthe 1950s. Opencast mining and the presence of large num-bers of private licensed mines will clearly remain a part of theindustry in the foreseeable future .

Here significant numbers of workers are employed on aquasi-casual basis . Some are unionised, but by no means all ofthem are . Many of the opencast operators have strong anti-union views . The relationship between these workers (andtheir trade union) and the deep mines is a perplexing question .As is their relationship with the people in whose localityopencast mines are established .

In an earlier article we tentatively pointed to the potentialsignificance of environmentalist protests against opencastexpansion (Beynon, Hudson and Sadler, 1986) . It would seemthat, currently, peoples' perceptions of their lives and theplaces in which they live are altering in important ways andin the coal districts this is of some significance . In theselocalities, for generations, people lived amongst the dirt andgrime of industrial production, in the firm belief that theindustries that led to environmental pollution were central tothe livelihood of their area, that pollution was part of life .'Where there's muck there's brass' . Yet surprisingly, and withsome speed, people in these areas seem to be taking a radicallydifferent view of things . In the wake of the closure of collieriesand steel mills, ex-miners and steel workers can be heard totalk of the 'human environment' and the future of theirfamilies . Men who, as children, slid down colliery waste heapsmay reminisce upon their past with some fondness but this isnow what they look to as a source of entertainment for their

children and grandchildren .In the North East it has been interesting to note how the

deepest sarcasm of the barristers employed by the opencastsector has been reserved for the person who has presentedevidence for the Miners Support Groups. Here an active group(comprised of many ex-miners) which developed during theminers' strike has engaged positively with the issue of opencastmining. It has presented evidence which combines a view ofthe future of the deep mines with an awareness of theenvironmental loss involved in the operation of the opencastsector .

These issues about the future pattern of coal and energysupply in Britain, and the environmental effects associatedwith it, are all contingent upon political decisions which haveopened up the coal sector to the pressures of the internationalcoal market. Changes in politics or in this market wouldclearly have their effects in the coalfields . Certain things(particularly certain certainties) seem to have changed for good,however . It is still far from clear where these changes will endup .


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114 References Atkinson, J.H. (1986)Opencast Coal Working', paper presented ata conference convened by CPRE, Stafford, October 1985) .

Barcus Close Inquiry (1984) Inspectors Report for the Barcus Close,Burnopfield, County Durham (October 1984) Appeal by WardBros . Plant Hire Ltd ., Ref. T/APP/Y1300/A/84/10480/p . 5 .

Beynon, H ., Hudson, R. and Sadler, D . (1986) 'Nationalisedindustries and the destruction of communities : some evidencefrom north east England', in Capital and Class No. 29 .

British Coal (1988) Annual Report and Accounts (1987/88) .British Coal Opencast Executive (1986) Opencast Coal - A National

Assessment .County Planning Officers' Society (1988) Opencast Coal Mining

Statistics 1987/88 .Department of Environment/Welsh Office (1988) Mineral Planning

Guidance Note No . 3 .Ellerbeck West Inquiry (1989) Inspectors Report (Mr J . Dunlop),

Ellerbeck West Opencast Public Inquiry, (February 1989) Ref .APP/c2300/A/87/67269 .

Flowers Report (1981) The Coal and the Environment, Department ofEnvironment .

House of Commons Select Committee on Energy (1987) First Report(Session 1986-87) The Coal Industry .

Hudson, R. Peck, F., and Sadler, D . (1986) Undermining Easington,University of Durham/Easington District Council .

Jones, B . (1988) 'Doctors Join Greens Against Opencast Mines', inThe New Statesman 3/6/88 .

MacGregor, I. (1986) The Enemies Within .Mason, J. and Samuelson, M ., (1989) 'Coal Imports Threaten Jobs',

in Financial Times 10.2.89 .Prior, M . and McCloskey, M . (1988) Coal on the Market, Financial

Times International Coal Report .Samuelson, M . (1989a) 'Coal Industry Under Threat', in Financial

Times 10 .2 .89 .Samuelson, M . (1989b) 'Scargill Says Cuts Prove Him Right', in

Financial Times 14 .2 .89 .Tait, N. (1989) 'Management Buy-Out Wins Control At Ryan', in

Financial Times 2 .2 .89 .Watson, M.W., Thomas, J ., Temple, J.M.F ., and Rees, H .G .

(1986) 'Opencast Mining and Health - The Effect of OpencastMining on Health in the Upper Neath Valley' .

huw beynon, andrew cox, ray hudson opencast coalmining and ... · ray hudson opencast coalmining...

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