Miners need answers on Orgreave strike policing

http://www.theguardian.com/politics/2015/jun/15/miners-need-answers-on-orgreave-strike-policing

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In the debate about Orgreave it is important to focus on the strategy used by the police against the miners (Give Orgreave a Hillsborough-style inquiry, Burnham urges Cameron, Letters, 13 June). The police operation at Orgreave was meticulously planned to intimidate, oppress and demoralise the miners. Tactics already used in Ireland, against minority communities and in other industrial disputes. Arresting pickets on a mass scale was one part of this strategy, using police from other forces was another. Many police during the strike could not be identified by their force identification number because they were not wearing any ID. This also led to suspicions that the army was involved in policing the strike.

In South Yorkshire, Sheffield Police Watch observed over a six-month period that there were numerous cases of “over policing”, when there was unprovoked violence and arbitrary arrests of pickets (during the strike, in total, 11,291 people were arrested). This tactic is exemplified by Orgreave, when, on their arrival, miners were ushered into the field by police – a change from the normal practice of blocking access routes and turning miners away from picketing.

The media reporting of Orgreave gave the impression that police use of violence, including charging with horses and using truncheons, was a response to unprovoked violence from the miners’ side. Propaganda used to demonise the NUM and the trade unions. Propaganda that has had lasting implications. In his diary of the event, Arthur Wakefield, a striking miner, said: “The riot squad charge up the field and turn to where we are standing peacefully and start hitting whoever they come across.” In a Commons debate towards the end of the strike, Tony Benn said: “I know from BBC editors who took part in the [BBC news] bulletin that there were three cavalry charges being made by the police before a single stone was thrown.”

A full public inquiry into the policing of Orgreave and the miners’ strike should clarify why, how and who made the decisions to police the miners’ strike in the way it was policed. This will help to ensure that the miners and mining communities get the truth and justice they deserve.Kate Flannery and Dr David EtheringtonSheffield

• I was a senior probation officer in Nottinghamshire in 1984. Driving to Nottingham with colleagues for a management meeting, we tried to come off the motorway at Mansfield but we were turned back by police, despite showing our ID cards. The courts were sitting in Mansfield till midnight on a regular basis, taking draconian action against anybody involved in the strike. The rule of law was in more or less complete abeyance and some locals coined the word “plodocracy” to describe who were our masters then. If the IPCC won’t hold an inquiry, an independent inquiry would surely uncover Hillsborough-style cover-ups across the piece.Andy StelmanBishops Castle, Shropshire