The strike was called by the National Executive Committee of the NUM and ended when the miners accepted an improved pay offer in a ballot.
[10] During a parliamentary debate on the strike in its second week, both Labour and Conservative MPs praised the miners for the forbearance shown during the mass pit closures in the 1960s.
Following some confrontations with NUM pickets, the National Coal Board adopted a policy of giving leave on full pay to any members of NACODS who faced aggressive intimidation on the way to work.
[14] A miner from Hatfield Colliery, near Doncaster, Freddie Matthews, was killed by a lorry while he was picketing on 3 February 1972, and a huge crowd attended his funeral.
[16] In the aftermath of the death, the picketing in the Doncaster area became more violent, with clashes reported with the NACODS members at Markham Main and Kilnhurst.
[18] The result was characterised as a "victory for violence" by the Conservative Cabinet at the time, in reference to some clashes between miners and police and to some throwing of stones and bottles at lorries trying to pass the pickets.
After release of government papers under the thirty-year rule, it has been revealed that civil servants, police, local authorities and other organisations worked on a secret project to gather hundreds of drivers to supply the country's power stations during the strike.
[21] Lord Wilberforce defended the increases, which represented a 27% pay rise,[22] by saying that "we know of no other job in which there is such a combination of danger, health hazard, discomfort in working conditions, social inconvenience and community isolation.
"[21] Mine workers held out for an extra £1 per week, but eventually settled for a package of "fringe benefits" worth a total of £10 million.