Comments on: The human cost of the stolen £millions https://www.coalaction.org.uk/2024/11/07/the-human-cost-of-the-stolen-millions/ Campaign to end the UK's coal mining, use, & support Fri, 06 Feb 2026 11:24:32 +0000 hourly 1 By: Daniel https://www.coalaction.org.uk/2024/11/07/the-human-cost-of-the-stolen-millions/#comment-1205 Tue, 11 Mar 2025 11:06:53 +0000 https://www.coalaction.org.uk/?p=16056#comment-1205 In reply to Richard Tamplin.

Thanks Richard – this certainly looks interesting: https://openlibrary.org/works/OL10997407W/A_reassessment_of_opencast_coalmining_in_the_light_of_the_current_energy_situation..?edition=key%3A/books/OL14362593M
My colleague may do a historical assessment of the struggle against opencast mining – if they do, they’ll definitely be in touch with you!

]]> By: Richard Tamplin https://www.coalaction.org.uk/2024/11/07/the-human-cost-of-the-stolen-millions/#comment-1204 Wed, 05 Mar 2025 16:39:18 +0000 https://www.coalaction.org.uk/?p=16056#comment-1204 A downright disgrace and a downright and utter insult to the people of South Wales, so many of whom gave their lives trying wrest a living out of the hills.
I was a member of OMIG (Opencast Mining Intelligence Group), now disappeared, but I took part in public inquiries across South and North Wales, Lancashire and County Durham. My argument was that opencast was all about transferring the costs, monetary and social, of getting coal from the nationalised deep mines to the private sector. We were rubbished by the NCB by Government and by local authorities who couldn’t see beyond “it’s jobs” arguments.
We warned that this is how it would end, that like the old mine owners before them these mining companies were interested only in one thing, private profit and getting out as soon as they had sucked communities of their life blood. I’m proud to have lived in Garndiffaith, a small mining community in the Eastern Valley and to have met so many wonderful people through my work. The same happened when I was moved to Woodland, a tiny settlement at the south-western end of the Durham coalfield.
But it was in South Wales that I was most proud to have lived and to have had the ability to support those communities at inquiries like Llanilid West near Bridgend and Brynhenllys in Breconshire. I recognise all those sites referred to like East Pit, Margam, Ffos y Fran and more, where the NCB and private operators were promising the earth (literally) and we said again and again that without a full bond covering the full cost of restoration deposited with the Coal Authority and monitored by a Committee of equal members of the community and the operators with a genuinely independent Chair before any start was allowed, the result would be environmental disaster. I’m so sorry that we were not successful in the long term and if I can do anything now, I shall be only too pleased to do so.
Do get in touch please.

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