Page 119 - Once a copper 10 03 2020

mask to protect their lungs. The dangers are many. He may be crushed to
death at any time by the falling roof. burned to death by the exploding of
gas or blown to pieces by a premature blast. And we thought policing had its
dangers.

Our visit down below was brief and sight of the claustrophobic working areas,
miners toiling with sweat and dirt drew considerable admiration and a better
understanding of the work these men undertook.

Our experiences of the mining community over, having witnessed families
torn apart by the dispute, father against son, brother against brother with one
crossing picket lines to work and the other on the picket line, left me thinking
that whatever the outcome, the decimation of whole communities was a
heavy price to pay.

As a serving officer, I have immense respect for police officers of all 43 UK
forces, so often putting the lives of others before their own in the humble
acceptance that its ‘part of the job we signed up for’. In the main, most
officers I met and worked alongside were driven by the sense of service to
the community, to make the world we live in a better place.

However, there is one memory from the miner’s dispute that left me ashamed
of the uniform we were usually so proud to wear.

As a week of mutual aid duty would
come to an end, we would develop
a good spirited humorous rapport
with workers, pickets and residents.
As the week ended, we would bid
them farewell, often knowing we
might be back at the same colliery
a week or a fortnight later. Bear in
mind that as the weeks progressed,
things were getting tighter and
tighter for the striking miners and by
now Christmas was just around the
corner, with the prospect of being
unable to afford even humble
rations. Many of the people we saw
Figure 51 Joking with the locals in the latter months seemed
exhausted and suffering the effects
of malnutrition.

It was bad enough leaving these folks, wondering how they would cope. Any
sympathy toward families like this was replaced with anger against our own, Page119
when officers from the City of London and Metropolitan forces (the richer of
the UK forces), would arrive in their pristine air-conditioned luxury coaches,