Ex-miner MP furious after Conservative councillor says North East has 'fond memories' of Margaret Thatcher

Ashington and Blyth MP Ian Lavery claimed parts of the region were still recovering from damage caused by the former Tory Prime Minister. It comes after the deputy leader of Northumberland County Council, Richard Wearmouth, told ITV News that Mrs Thatcher did “amazing things” for the country.

Speaking at the Conservative Party Conference on what would have been the Iron Lady’s 100th birthday, he pointed out that the Nissan Factory was brought to Sunderland during her controversial tenure as Prime Minister.

But Mr Lavery, who took to the picket lines himself during the infamous 1984/85 Miners’ Strike as a 21-year-old apprentice at Ellington Colliery, was less complimentary. He launched a scathing attack on Mrs Thatcher’s time in office.

The Ashington native, who went on to succeed Arthur Scargill as president of the National Union of Mineworkers (NUM) said: “My experience is that Margaret Thatcher is despised across vast swathes of the North East. She is remembered not as a leader, but as the person who branded ordinary people ‘the enemy within’.

“She butchered our industries, tore through our communities, and left behind a legacy of destruction and poverty that we are still struggling to recover from. And let’s not forget—she took the milk from our children. ‘Thatcher the milk snatcher’ isn’t just a slogan; it’s a symbol of the callousness that defined her and her government.”

The “milk snatcher” nickname was given to Mrs Thatcher by the press after the abolition of free milk for school children aged seven to 11 during her spell as Education Secretary in 1971. When Thatcher chose to do battle with the miners in the 1980s, there were still 17 pits across the North East. A wave of pit closures followed the end of the strike in 1985.

In Ashington, the Woodhorn pit closed in 1981 and the Ashington pit closed in 1988. Ellington lasted until 2005, when it was the last deep coal pit in the North East. In Blyth, only the Bates’ Pit was left by the time the 1980s arrived, before shutting down in 1986.

According to the 2021 census, the Cowpen area of Blyth and the Ashington’s Hirst ward had the highest lvels of deprivation in the North East – both are former mining communities with strong links to the industry.

Responding to Mr Lavery’s remarks, Coun Wearmouth pointed out that the current Conservative administration is investing heavily in both Blyth and Ashington. He said: “Ian and I actually get on but I doubt we will see eye to eye on this. I’m as much a North East lad as Ian, even if we are separated in age by a few decades.

“I watched as a kid in the 80’s as union kingpin Arthur Scargill abused his position and our communities trust to demand the impossible in order to bring down Conservative governments. He failed but it was coalfield communities that faced the cost, not Scargill in his plush London mansion paid for with union money.

“That said I don’t dwell in the past. Just as the Tory government did with Nissan in the 1980s, it was our Conservative council, working with the last Tory government that brought the railway back to Ashington; landed £20bn investments in places like Cambois; that commissioned the new Ashington College, Seaton Valley Super School, Cramlington Learning Village rebuild, the STEM and welding centres in Blyth and many other projects changing communities for the better.

“There’s plenty more good stuff to come and I look forward to working with Ian to get this Labour government to do what Boris did and Tony Blair failed to – to put its money where its mouth is and back us with key projects like the rebuilds of Moor Farm and Seaton Burn roundabouts, the regeneration of the Hirst, expansion of the Northumberland Line and much much more.”