He was reacting to news that Cabinet papers released under the 30-year rule had highlighted a behind-closed-doors agreement to shut not 20 mines, but up to 75 over three years.
„After the Ted Heath Government had been defeated by the NUM [in 1974] there was a plan to take on the miners,“ said Mr Newton, who was an NUM rep at Edwinstowe‘s Thoresby Colliery, one of the most productive in Europe.