Archive for Miners’ Strike

A Day in Cardiff

Posted in Art, Biographical, Cardiff, LGBTQ+, Opera, Politics with tags , , , , , on April 5, 2025 by telescoper

I got up at Stupid O’Clock this morning to catch an early morning plane from Dublin to Cardiff. It was very cold when I  arrived but it soon warmed up and turned into a lovely day.

I had a nice breakfast at Bill’s when I arrived in the City then did tour of the National Museum of Wales where there is an exhibition about the Miners’ Strike of 1984/5, from which this display case caught my attention:

I also had time for a round of Name That Artist (scoring a miserable 3/12, for Sutherland, Ernst, and Magritte).

After that, I took a stroll around Bute Park before heading to my hotel in Cardiff Bay to check in and have a rest before the reason for my visit, an event which will take place here at 7pm:

I won’t be able to blog about that until I get back to Maynooth tomorrow afternoon.

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40 years since the beginning of the ‘three day week’

Posted in History, Politics with tags , , , on January 4, 2014 by telescoper

Is it really 40 Years ago?
I wonder how many of you are old enough to remember the “Three Day Week”? I am. In fact I remember sitting my 11+ examination right in the middle of the period (from January to March 1974) in which electricity supplies across the UK were restricted to three days per week. Although it meant reading books by candlelight, it wasn’t as bad as it may sound to younger readers because we didn’t have that many electrical gadgets in those days and at least our house was heated by coal, not electricity. I dread to think what would happen nowadays if we should experience  problems with fuel supplied similar to those caused by the Oil Crisis of 1974. But such an event is not altogether impossible…

hatfulofhistory's avatarNew Historical Express

 

This week marks the 40th anniversary of the beginning of the ‘three day week’, which lasted from 1 January to 6 March 1974. The ‘three day week’ was an initiative by the Heath Government to avoid the stand-still of Britain’s industry in response to the Oil Crisis of late 1973 and the threat of a strike by the National Union of Mineworkers (who were on a ‘work to rule’ basis at the time). It involved cutting electricity supplies to three consecutive days per week to conserve coal stocks, which was threatened by a strike by mineworkers.

A search of the digitised Cabinet Papers available through the National Archives show how the Heath Government approached the looming threat of a strike by the NUM and the energy crisis faced by Britain in 1973-74. One Cabinet meeting from 20 December, 1973 outlined the problem facing the Heath Government and the…

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