What If Scargill Had Won?

This is a blog posing a question rather than one giving an opinion. I want the reasoned, informed, sometimes bizarre comments from the nextleft community to give me a range of answers to my 'what if..? question.

Today is 25 years since the minor's strike and I heard a piece on Radio 4 with Scargill speaking to a socialist group. His passionate voice hasn't changed a bit * and I could imagine myself as a 10 year old in front of our black and white TV. At the time there was a real sense that this would be a turning point, and so it was. The fascinating bit is that Scargill said a Tory cabinet minister of the time has since told him that the minors were so close to winning out at one point.

If Scargill and the striking minors had won, presumably the Thatcher government would have fallen. Would Kinnock have taken their place and suddenly become the hero of the minors and the country? Would the country have been split? And would figures like Blair have ever seen the light of day?

Blog away...

* I must admit part of me yearns for that sort of passion to be heard in politics nowadays, even though it may be mis-placed.

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