Smashing Good Time At Doe Hill!

Friday 31st October was the last day for submissions to the government's "Opencast Coal Review" which has been out for consultation since July. As usual EF! went further than the 'normal' channels for making our views known, deciding that a site occupation would make the point. Well, some of us did - others thought maybe even that wouldn't make our views clear enough...

Some innovative precautions were taken to prevent being tracked, such as wrapping mobile phones in silver foil. Mysteriously, the police didn't seem at all interested. At 6.15am, a coach and 3 vans all arrived at different points of the Doe Hill House opencast mine at Tibshelf, near Chesterfield. It's a site operated by H J Banks, a particularly notorious company, known for their habit of extending sites on which they have planning permission, thus mining much larger areas than they would originally be allowed to. The site at Tibshelf has a rail-head - almost unheard of for opencast sites, and a sign that they're clearly planning to mine that area for a number of years.

As dawn broke, further vehicles arrived from the meeting point in Barnsley. A driver of one of the coaches wasn't too happy with the goings-on of his clients and tried to grass them up to a quarry worker. Unfortunately, he picked a mine-worker who was, in fact, a scout who'd been checking the area for police before our arrival.

The site was overrun in minutes and totally dismantled within an hour. Numerous people displaying vigour not commonly seen at such an early hour. Several lighting rigs were given flying lessons, proving that Newton's First Law is alive and crashing. Lemmings looked on in interest. According to the police, the damage was estimated at £375,000 and the workers were laid off for a week while equipment was repaired.

As it all happened so quickly....50 people went off to take over the offices of Harry Banks in nearby Chesterfield. .Having been persuaded that they'd be able to send a fax to the Department of Environment, Transport and the Region at 2.15, they were all waiting when the cops arrived at 1.50. There were 47 arrests, including a woman with a baby and several people who were only sitting outside. Only 3 people managed to avoid arrest by being in the car park at the time, one of whom had gone out to listen to 'The Archers' in his car. Everyone else's vehicles got impounded - maybe parking in the car park of the offices that were being occupied was not such a good idea.

Everyone was released without charge, some after over 24 hours, and bailed to return in January, except for one bloke who had a warrant out. There was a meeting on 30th Nov for everyone who was arrested and there will be another one on 8th December, probably in Sheffield. Phone Leeds EF! 0113 262 9365

'No Opencast' is a campaign run by the National Union of Mineworkers (NUM) and supported by Women Against Pit Closures and by members of the Miners Support Groups, which did so much for the miners during the strike in the '80s and the pit closures in the '90s. Frustrated by Heseltine's blatant lies and the Tories' open attempts to destroy mineworkers' lives and communities, and by the more-than-usually loaded planning process, they decided to take more radical action. Contact 0171 603 1831.