£30 million Compensation to Rotherham Miners Under Labour

Denis MacShane has revealed that £30 million pounds have been paid to miners and their families in the Borough of Rotherham under compensation schemes initiated by the Labour government.

In a letter to Pat Keenan, secretary of the Rotherham Trades Union Council MacShane writes:

    Please give my apologies for the TUC meeting on 6th December. I have been involved with talks with the Finnish Outokumpu stainless steel company in respect of jobs at their plant just opposite the cooling towers on the M1. It is in Clive Betts’ constituency so he is leading on this but all South Yorkshire MPs are urging the company to revise down their job reduction plans.

    I received a Parliamentary reply showing that former miners and their families in Rotherham constituency have received more than £10 million in compensation for occupational-related illnesses. The measure of retrospective social justice (£30 million altogether for the Borough of Rotherham) is a small example of redistribution of taxpayers’ money from the Notting Hill Tories to Labour areas.

    I hope all unions will give serious consideration to the Turner report on pensions. We need a balanced approach to pensions so that future workers are not dependent on individual company pension funds which are subject to a) the ups and downs of the stock market and b) the arrival of new owners or managers who decide to plunder a company pension fund for various reasons.

    By the time the TUC meets we should have confirmed the next leader of the Tories. Labour has to become more political and less managerial as otherwise we will see the base of our support erode.

    There was a good turn-out of Labour councillors and activists on Saturday in the town centre to hand our new 2006 calendars outlining my work in Rotherham as MP. We are planning to write to 2,000 constituents at a time to invite them to coffee mornings to discuss political activity – and top priority remains defeating any effort by extremist politics, notably the racist and anti-semitic BNP from establishing a foothold amongst voters.