In June 1989 a lone figure halting a battalion of tanks in the Chinese capital Beijing sent shockwaves around the world. It is an act which China itself prefers to forget. What had started as a peaceful student protest calling for freedom and democracy ended seven weeks later in carnage. Storyville: Tiananmen: The People v the Party, BBC 2019
Thirty years on, eye-witness accounts and secret documents now help provide a deeper understanding of how the Tiananmen massacre changed the course of Chinese history. ibid.
Large scale protests broke out in 21 provinces. ibid.
On the evening of May 19th Premier Li Peng revealed to the Party the emergency plan to suppress the students. ibid.
More than 200,000 soldiers from the People’s Liberation Army had been deployed. ibid.
The hunger strike was abandoned in favour of the permanent occupation of the Square. ibid.
Martial law was under threat from within through an unprecedented mutiny within every rank of the People’s Army itself. ibid.
On May 23th one million Beijing workers staged a mass strike in support of the student’ call for democracy. ibid.
News of the crackdown had brought more people out on the streets … They were the first to discover the brutal truth. ibid.
The miners’ strike was a war between the Thatcher government and the unionised miners. Melvyn Bragg on Class & Culture III, BBC 2012
The violence and intimidation we have seen should never happened. It is the work of extremists. It is the enemy within. Margaret Thatcher
Mrs Thatcher came to power on a promise to middle England. But she saw one big obstacle in the way … How she dismantled it: the cunning, the ruthlessness as she weaponised the police. And the killer instinct … Thatcher vs the Miners. Mrs Thatcher vs The Miners: The Battle for Britain, Channel 5 2021
Thatcher watched on as Ted Heath made a fatal mistake. Heath called an election on the question, Who runs Britain – the Tory government or the Miners? Heath lost. ibid.
‘Scargill and Thatcher deserved each other; absolutely no-one else deserved either of them.’ ibid. Neil Kinnock
Spurred on by his first brush with Thatcher, Scargill demanded a pay rise for his miners towards the end of 1983. The government refused. So the miners stopped working overtime. But Scargill had miscalculated Thatcher’s determination to stand firm. And on March 6th 1984 when news leaked out that Cortonwood colliery in Yorkshire would be shut down, and the men would all lose their jobs, Scargill was taken by complete surprise. The men walked out on strike immediately. A few days later, it was announced that another twenty pits would close with 20,000 job losses. Caught off guard, Scargill went for the kill and called for a national strike. ibid.
When the men walked out of the collieries, Scargill didn’t call a national vote. This was his next big mistake. ibid.
On March 12 1984 Scargill’s call for action resulted in almost 165,000 men downing tools and walking out on strike. Over 35,000 others remained at work. ibid.
Those on strike had nothing; they weren’t entitled to benefits. Families were really struggling. ibid.
One thing Thatcher did underestimate was their resilience. ibid.
The Christmas bonus really worked, and it became clear that the strike was nearing its end game. ibid.
Many here work at Marikana, one of the world’s largest platinum mines. What happened here over six days last August has changed South Africa for ever. Fed up with low wages, thousands of the miners went on an unofficial strike. This World: South Africa: The Massacre that Changed a Nation, BBC 2013
What happened next shocked the world. ibid.
The brutality meted out at Marikana and the fact that there was then an attempt to cover it up, and plant evidence, and torture some of the strikers ... is deeply deeply depressing as well as absolutely outrageous. ibid.
The United Mine Workers of America staged a fourteen-month strike against the Rockefeller company. An assault on the striking coal miners was ordered on April 20th 1914. The Secret Plan of the New World Order
In that sense, I became politicized because the people in the coal mining villages who were involved in the struggle knew why they were there. But they couldn’t understand why some pop star from London would want to be there. Billy Bragg
Chainmaking: Patience say that from the age of ten she worked relentlessly and hardly ever had a day off … A new minimum wage, which meant that chainmaking companies had to pay their workers a whole penny more, an increase of over 50%. So how did the owners respond? Easy. They just refused to pay it … In 1910 the National Federation of Women Workers called a strike. In retaliation the employers locked the chainmakers out … Patience aged 79 joined the march … And after a ten-week standoff the employers finally caved in. Tony Robinson’s History of Britain s2e2: Edwardians, Channel 4 2022
The nurses are going on strike. Which means I’m going to have to go back to getting my prostate examined by that drifter in Asda car park. Frankie Boyle’s New World Order, BBC 2022
I was a shop steward for the Apprentices. The Apprentices’ Strike [April 1960] – that was a really important moment for me. It was great. Being part of it. It wasn’t about, you, it was about us. About being a team. Sir Alex Ferguson: Never Give In, Channel 4 2022
Courtaulds Ltd: 900 workers went on strike after a row with the management … ‘The strike as such here involved coloured people.’ Michael X: Hustler, Revolutionary, Outlaw, Malcolm’s BBC interview, Sky Showcase 2021
The right to strike is a fundamental human right. If you’re not able to do that, the employer and the government can dictate to you what you do as a previously free individual. That’s not acceptable. Mick Lynch
Bloody Sunday: 1911 Liverpool general transport strike. As protest of up to 85,000 gather, Home Secretary Winston Churchill sends troops and armoured cars into Liverpool to break the strike, and positions the gunboat HMS Antrim on the Mersey. Soldiers also opened fire on a crowd in Vauxhall Road, killing 2, injuring 15. Ragged Trousered Philanderer tweet 14 April 2023
The purpose of this demonstration is to publicize the situation that three of our lads are faced with in jail; secondly, to point out that there are another eight now on trial, and another ten pending trial. Justice for the Salisbury Pickets ***** man with megaphone, Platform Films 2011
In 1973 Ricky Tomlinson and Des Warren were 2 of 24 building workers charged under an 1875 Conspiracy law for their part in organising the first national builders’ strike. The jailing of the Shrewsbury Pickets was not an isolated incident, more the start of a concerted campaign to criminalise rank and file trade union activists. In the 30 years since their imprisonment we have witnessed the increasing use of laws aimed at weakening organized workers’ ability to defend living standards and working conditions. ibid.
‘Working conditions were appalling; men were being killed.’ ibid. Elsa Warren, 2009
With 2,411 workers killed on building sites in the 10 previous years and with over 30,000 serious injuries, the 1972 national building strike had to challenge the lump system if wages and working conditions were to be improved. Tens of thousands of workers downed tools around Britain. ibid.
Later that summer, an even bigger show of working class solidarity had forced the release of five dockers jailed in Pentonville Prison for refusing to recognise the government’s industrial relations court. ibid.
‘We were accompanied at all times by the police.’ ibid. Tomlinson
‘The case was political because the start of the trial there was at least 1,000 police all around the court. ibid. John Jones
‘Two of the jury changed their mind … The court usher had gone into the jury room.’ ibid. Tomlinson
A savage campaign in the Tory press condemned the pickets for violence when in fact they had taken lawful means to spread the strike. ibid.
One of the most vicious attacks inflicted on the labour movement since the Second World War. ibid.
I really am gasping like a fish out of water. And I’m in pain. The Miners’ Film, Youtube 46.37, miner, Cinema Action 1974/5
Miners’ ban on overtime a tactic to reduce coal stocks November ’73 to January ’74. ibid. caption
They [miners] are being restricted to negotiate a reasonable wage directly with the employer. ibid. miner
It we fail, everyone else fails. ibid.
They [police] are just stopping and harassing all the time. ibid.
1954: 699,000 miners; 1974: 252,000 Miners. ibid.
81% of miners vote for strike action Jan/Feb 1974. ibid.
Dockers fight for the right to work. Arise Ye Workers: The Dockers’ Fight, caption, 1973
We believe that the way it’s been handled in our industry is an example of employers’ greed. ibid. Docker
These unregistered docks are a sore problem in relation to our industry. ibid.
Mass workers’ action: we march on Pentonville. ibid. caption
The five of us was put in [prison] by a political court and it was the trade union movement that got us out. ibid. docker