Produced by a Tyneside women’s video collective, an amateur production about the work done by the various women support groups across Durham and Northumberland during the 1984-85 Miners' Strike. From running Support Kitchens to joining the men on the pick lines women from across the region tell their stories of hardship and comradeship as well as their direct experiences of both police brutality and a biased criminal justice system. The film also looks back on the 1926 General Strike...

Produced by a Tyneside women’s video collective, an amateur production about the work done by the various women support groups across Durham and Northumberland during the 1984-85 Miners' Strike. From running Support Kitchens to joining the men on the pick lines women from across the region tell their stories of hardship and comradeship as well as their direct experiences of both police brutality and a biased criminal justice system. The film also looks back on the 1926 General Strike speaking with women who were involved in the dispute comparing their experiences with those of women in 1984-85. Over the opening credits Mal Finch sings ‘Here We Go’ as women and their families makes their way across the High-Level Bridge in Newcastle heading towards St Nicholas’ Street. At the front a banner for the North-east region Women Against Pit Closures, behind many other banners for the various women’s support groups taking part. Some of the women shout ‘Maggie, Maggie Maggie, Out, Out, Out!’ Title: Never Done Anything Like This Before Title: A video tape celebrating north eastern women’s action. Made during the 1984/85 Miners’ Strike, with anecdotes from the 1920s. Put together by a Tyneside women’s video collective Title: In co-operation with Blyth, Boldon, Burnhope, Chopwell, Durham, Easington, Sacriston, Sunderland, Westoe and Whittle women and support groups As a group of women and miners stand beside banners including ones for Burnhope Women’s Support Group and Washington Miners Family Support Group. In her kitchen an interview with Paula Jackson from Ellington Support Group who explains that the only way the miners were going to win this strike is if their wives and families were behind them. She goes onto talk about how she became involved in the development of a support group at Ellington Colliery. Over still images of women taking part in previous disputes, narrator Paula Jackson explains how women have often been involved in industrial action, but their actions are seldom recorded except as traditional women’s roles of cooking, cleaning and providing for the family. Oral interview with Claire of Westoe who remembers some of the hardships of the 1926 General Strike. As she speaks a photograph of her being interviewed and general views of the pit village and colliery at Beamish, the Living Museum of the North. With Paula Jackson providing narration further descriptions of hardships during the 1926 General Strike are illustrated with photographs and newspaper clippings of the era intercut with more views around Beamish Museum. Standing beside a Rumbelows electrical retailer shop window, Paula explains how miners today have worked hard to build up and own some of the consumer goods featured in the window. Back in her kitchen Paula continues to talk about the challenges and hardships of current long running dispute and how the government was cutting Social Security payments to striking families. Interview with another miner’s wife from Blyth who explains why she is involved in the strike. She says it’s to support her family and about keeping her pit open. She is fearful that if it closes Blyth will become a ghost-town. Title: In May 1985 Bates Colliery in Blyth was given notice of closure In the rain another woman explains why she is involved in strike action, again it relates to the future of her children and the lack of job opportunities in the area. She explains that there are young people who getting into the 20’s who’ve never had a job. She is very critical of Margaret Thatcher and her reactionary government and believes enough-is-enough. At Burnhope, Boldon and Westoe women support groups gather in living rooms and a hall to organise and become visible. At one of them a small child sleeps in a push chair. Interview with Anne Suddock, an organiser for some of the Durham groups, who talks about how groups first came about and evolved because of a need. As long as there is a need, she believes, people will respond. Pages from the newspaper ‘The Labour Women’ produced during the 1926 General Strike and more archival images of soup kitchens were put together by the women. In Support Kitchen’s at Sunderland and Blyth run by local women’s support groups a line of mainly children queue to receive a free meal. In the kitchen one woman washing up, in another part of the hall other women working at speed to plate up food for those waiting patiently. One of the women explains that they are involved in jumble sales and door-to-door collections for donation, two of the striking miners enjoying a meal talks about the importance of the women’s support and when they should and should not join the men on the picket lines. As striking miners and their families sit at tables enjoying their meal, Paula Jackson explains in voice-over how women were having to learn to become Catering Managers and Fund Raisers overnight and having to deal with large sums of money. At her own support group at Ellington they were handing £3000 a week to feed 2000 men and their families. At Sacristan in County Durham a shop window of a ‘Nearly New’ shop run by the local women’s support group changes to more black and white photographs and pages from ‘The Labour Women’ from 1926 relating to the national organisation the Women’s Relief Committee and its works to raise funds with the likes of ‘Lamp Days’ and through visits to Russia. Interview with Jane Hampton who was involved in the General Strike and how women raised money by collecting shoes for miners to repair while on picket line. Janes interview ends with her explains how she and other women marched with the men changes to a bus where women from across Durham and Northumberland are travelling to London to take part in the Women’s National Rally on the 11th August 1984. They gather around the back of the bus and sing a miner’s version of the American Civil war song ‘Tramp Tramp Tramp The Boys Are Marching’. As they get off the bus in London and stand ready to join the other 23,000 women that day beside their respective banners, they sing other song adapted to the miner’s struggle as well as Geordie anthem ‘Blaydon Races’. Interview with some of the women about why they are here and why they would want the men with them. One of the women believes the low police presence is due to the fact that no men were marching that day, she is also critical of the media for the number of negative stories about striking miners. The protest march makes its way through London, at the head the banner for the North-east region Women Against Pit Closures seen at the start of the film. Many in the march carry placards that read ‘Victory to the Miners’ and ‘Coal not Dole’ and others march alongside the women’s support group banners from Westoe, Horden and Easington to name a few. Many of the women sing a protest song as they pass, one banner produced by Langley Park Women’s Support Group features a caricature of Margaret Thatcher being beaten by a National Union of Mineworkers (N.U.M.) rolling pin. As the women from Whittle Park pass carrying their banner they shout ‘Maggie, Maggie, Maggie, Out, Out. Out!’. Arthur Scargill, President of the N.U.M, stands on a stage waiting on the crowd of women in front of him stops singing ‘We’ll Support you Ever More’. He makes a speech in which he acknowledges the power, ability and organisation strength of women to fight for their own industry and community. Anne Lilburn, chairwoman of the National Women against Pit Closures Organisation, then makes a speech about her husband. As she finishes the crowds sing ‘Here We Go!’. Following the speeches, the women gather in a park sitting on the grass chatting, a banner resting against a gate is for ‘Jarrow Miners Families Support Group’. In voiceover Paula Jackson explains how the women have become more politically aware and that they are fighting not just for their pits and communities but also their class which they believe the Tories are out to destroy. As Paula talks about the women’s initial belief that the police and judiciary would remain unbiased during the strike, the film changes to a local Magistrates Court where one of Paula’s friends speaks following her convicted of Breach of the Peace. The anger and resentment in hers and those around her is palpable with Paula standing beside her states clearly that she is convinced the policeman who initially arrested her friend had just lied in court. In a local pub over drinks and cigarettes her friend explains what happened leading up to her arrest and conviction. At Red Row in Northumberland men who have decided to go back to work stand on one side of a suburban road while on the other women from a local support group stand picketing. A police presence stands by as the men climb aboard a bus that will take them to the colliery. Some of the women in the crowd shout in disgust at the men onboard, as the bus pulls away some scream ‘Scab!’. Interview with one of the protesting women who sees the actions of these men as despicable as it has split the community into two. Two still images showing a policeman on horseback hitting a protesting woman with his baton changes to a group of men and women being escorted into the colliery by police. Two women from Burnhope and then Boldon support groups talk about their experience of violence by the police. Outside the entrance of Sacriston Colliery women picketers come face-to-face with a line of police. The women shout and jeerer ‘Scab’ at police vans as they drive past into the colliery. With the protest over for now the police march away. Interview with two of the women from the picket line about how their experience of violence and bias by the police. With the two pitheads of Ellington Colliery in the background, Paula Jackson talks about her own experience of police brutality. As she speaks a picket line with miners and police pushing and shoving each other outside a colliery. More police arrive with riot gear and picketers are arrested and violently taken away. Almost in tears Paula talks about striking miners not as thugs, but heroes and that the police were ‘Maggie Thatcher’s Boot Boys’. More black and white photographs and articles from ‘The Labour Women’ with Paula Jackson explaining that while women did join the men on the picket lines in 1926, it was seldom recorded with stories of their efforts being passed down by word of mouth. A clip from an unidentified television programme in which a woman talks about her experience on the picket line during the 1926 General Strike over a series of archival images. Standing with an older man she tells a story about a local Parson’s son who decided to go down the miner and what the women did to him when he got back to the surface. As the woman finishes her story contemporary footage of a walk through a local graveyard that relates to the story being told. A woman featured earlier from the Burnhope support group talks about the experiences of her mother protesting during the General Strike and her experiences of not just dealing with the police but also the army. Title: In 1926 CHURCHILL said of the miners “Drive them back down the holes like rats”. In 1984 THATCHER called the miners “the enemy within” Still standing in front of the pitheads at Ellington Colliery, Paula Jackson concludes this film by explaining that since the history of women protestors during 1926 has been hidden from them, they have taken inspiration from the women at Greenham Common. She doesn’t think women will be the same after 1984 and there are major battles ahead with proposals to open a nuclear power station in Northumberland that would see the closure of Ellington, one of the largest collieries in Europe. Over the first part of the closing credits Mal Finch once again singing ‘Here We Go’ and the women from the region’s support groups march through London as part of the Women’s National Rally. Title: Thanks to Amber Films, Beamish Museum, Tommy Callan (Durham N.U.M.), Gateshead Library, Hugh Kelly, John Gorman Collection, Newcastle Media Workshop, Trade Films Title: Stories of the 1926 actions from Wardley, Burnhope and Chopwell Song ‘Here We Go’ Mal Finch/Flaming Nerve Grant aided by Northern Arts Credit: ‘Magination Media Karina Jamieson, Annie Lockwood, Fran Martin, Connie Pickard, Monica Sheehan, Barbara Stabler Black and white still photographs taken from the strike featuring police and female protestors. Title: Thanks to Maureen Callcott, Albert Nugent, Keith Pattinson, Trade Films, Chris Wainwright End title: and Paula Jackson, Ann Suddick, Margo Newton and the Blyth women, Pat Dunn, Ann Lilburn and the Whittle Women, Lily Ross and the Burnhope women, Anna Phelps and the Sacriston women, Ann Kendrick and the Westoe women, the Boldon women, the Sunderland women, the Easington Women