Beginning August: After South Wales NUM is fined £50,000 the NUM calls on the TUC and the rest of the trade union movement for solidarity action. Nothing happens. The movement begins to go into retreat, although the miners would remain, fundamentally, solid until November.
There was nothing inevitable about this: many groups of workers had their own battles to fight, battles which could have turned into support for the miners, but either these were not seriously fought or the Government intervened to ensure that they were settled quickly.
8 August: 50p a week trade union levy in support of NUM introduced. MacGregor writes to all striking miners urging a return to work.
16 August: South Wales NUM found in contempt of court for refusing to pay fine. £770,000 of their funds seized.
24 August-18 September: Second docks strike; it begins after unloading of coal at Hunterstone.
Late August: National Working Miners' Committee set up by David Hart. A few scabs appear in South Yorkshire. Mass picketing resumes to stop scabbing. Police occupy the pit villages to "protect" working miners and barricade pits so that a few men can go in.
