Ұлыбритания Кеншілер Федерациясының тарихы

The Miners' Federation of Great Britain (MFGB) was established after a meeting of local mining trade unions in Newport, Wales in 1888. The federation was formed to represent and co ordinate the affairs of local and regional miners' unions in England, Scotland and Wales whose associations remained largely autonomous. At its peak, the federation represented nearly one million workers. It was reorganised into the National Union of Mineworkers in 1945.

The MFGB joined the Trades Union Congress (TUC) in 1890. In 1893, 300,000 colliery workers were locked out when the mine owners demanded they take a 25% cut in pay. Six weeks into the dispute, two men were killed at a colliery in Featherstone in Yorkshire after the Riot Act had been read and soldiers opened fire on the assembled men. The strike ended nine weeks later after the mine owners backed down. The MFGB participated in the 1906 Royal Commission on mines' safety and by 1908 had secured an eight hour day for underground workers. Improving miners' working conditions was important to the federation and Robert Smillie represented it in the Royal Commission on mines' safety that led to the Mines' Regulation Act in 1911. A lockout in 1910 by Cambrian Collieries in South Wales in a dispute about wage cuts led to a ten month long strike by 12,000 men. Home Secretary, Winston Churchill, sent troops to Tonypandy where they charged a group of striking miners with fixed bayonets on 21 November. The strikers returned to work defeated but a conference in 1911 called for a minimum wage. The demand led to the six week long National coal strike of 1912 in which more than one million miners participated. The onset of World War I in 1914 led to calls for the repeal of the eight hour day and increased productivity. South Wales miners struck in 1915 and increased pay was demanded in 1916 resulting in the coalfields being put into state control. In 1914 the MFGB had joined with the National Union of Railwaymen (NUR) and the National Transport Workers' Federation (NTWF) in the Triple Alliance. In 1919 the Sankey Commission was set up to which the MFGB, colliery owners and government considered the future of the mining industry and two years later the government returned management of the collieries to their owners. In 1921 a decision by the NUR and NTWF not to strike in sympathy with the miners is remembered as Black Friday and signalled the end of the alliance. In 1941 an Essential Work Order was imposed on the mines. In 1942 proposals to merge all districts and local associations into a single miners' union were drafted. After the Labour government was elected in the 1945 general election, the passing of the Coal Industry Nationalisation Act 1946 meant all the industry's assets, rights and liabilities passed to the National Coal Board and the MFGB was reorganised into a single union, the National Union of Mineworkers.

The miners' unions were the largest and most powerful industrial combinations in Britain for decades and exercised a great influence on the rest of the British labour movement. The first working class MPs, Thomas Burt and Alexander Macdonald were elected in 1874. They represented mining constituencies and were funded by miners' associations. Elected as Liberal Labour candidates, they supported by the Liberal Party. The Independent Labour Party (ILP), formed in 1893, was never very influential in the coalfields, but the Lib Labs responded to its calls for independent labour candidatures by proposing that the federation would support any candidate put forward by a member union, regardless of the political party. When the proposal was adopted many unions put forward Liberal candidates, but the Lancashire and Cheshire Miners' Federation was an early affiliate of the Labour Representation Committee (LRC), and the Scottish Miners' Federation was the principal backer of the Scottish Workers' Representation Committee. Other districts chose not to involve themselves in politics. In the early 1900s, many affiliates were frustrated with the Liberal Party's reluctance to adopt trade union candidates or take up trade union matters in Parliament. In 1906, the MFGB held a national ballot on whether to affiliate to the LRC. The proposal was defeated by 101,714 votes to 92,222. South Wales, Scotland, Yorkshire and Lancashire, the largest affiliates, were in favour of joining, but most smaller affiliates were strongly opposed. After the close vote, the transformation of the LRC into the Labour Party and newly affiliated unions from Durham and Northumberland to the MFGB, a second ballot was held in 1908. While the pattern of voting was similar, increased membership of the largest affiliates and stronger support among them, led to the earlier decision being overturned by 213,137 votes to 168,446. The Communist Party of Great Britain, founded in 1920, attempted to bypass the MFGB in gaining support among miners. It set up the Miners' Minority Movement, which saw initial success when activist A. J. Cook was elected as the MFGB General Secretary, but a motion for the MFGB to affiliate to the communist Red International of Labour Unions attracted little support, and Cook later distanced himself from the communists. The MFGB did support allowing the CPGB to affiliate with the Labour Party in 1936, but the party leadership refused.