The fires at Britain’s last remaining coal-burning power station in Ratcliffe-on-Soar have gone out, bringing the curtain down on the nation’s 142-year marriage to fossil fuels.
Of course, the transition had to happen. As fuels go, coal is one of the worst polluters you can find. Beyond the carbon emissions, smog and acid rain it creates, it also causes lung disease and respiratory illnesses. Britain’s urban air quality is far from stellar, even in the absence of these noxious chemicals – just imagine what the case would be if they were still around.
And yet, as much as our environment has benefitted from the switch, to ignore the devastating blow it dealt to the communities sustained by mining coal is a gross misjustice. It is not the transition that should make you angry; it is the dismal way it was (mis)managed that should (still) be lighting fires.
The playwright James Graham spoke movingly in an essay marking the end of coal on the Today Programme. Noting that London’s iconic Battersea Power Station has been preserved – it is a grade-II listed building now home to swanky shops, restaurants and waterside bars – he called for similar consideration to be given to some of the enormous cooling towers of the type that overlook the town of Ratcliffe-on-Soar.
Those mighty sentinels were once as good as any sign saying “welcome to the industrial north” – and as the child of a steel-working family who married a woman from a coal-mining family, I agree with Graham.
At the same time, we should be cautious about romanticising coal as some kind of “king”. It was not a kind, much less a gentle, ruler. It took a brutal toll on its subjects. But if we’re going to preserve a London power station – perhaps because it happened to be on a couple of album covers (Pink Floyd’s Animals and The Orb’s Adventures Beyond the Ultraworld) – surely they deserve the same consideration?
One reason why perservation might not go down well in certain quarters is that the towers stand in mute testimony to the failure I mentioned; failure not just of the state, but of its favoured economic dogma – laissez-faire: leave it to the market.
That market failed coal mining communities. The industry provided thousands of men (because it was mostly men) with well-paying jobs that supported communities, paid mortgages, put food on the table, sustained families.
After the brutal strikes of the 1980s, which pitched those communities into a vicious war between left and right, those communities were largely left to fend for themselves. What replaced the mines were call centres, warehouses and other poorly paying service sector employers.
Did Labour do any better by these communities than the Tories? They did not. Benign neglect is still neglect.
So, is it any wonder the siren song of the Reform Party is being heard so loudly in these places, given the history? Former coal-mining communities have shown their disdain time and again. The Brexit vote (which I remain vehemently opposed to), which was essentially a giant “F– you!” to those who left them behind. Then, they shattered the red wall in the 2019 election when voting in Boris Johnson.
Lately, there has been a recognition that something needs to change. We’ve heard talk of industrial policies and strategies and the need for investment – rightly so. Perhaps devolution will also help, handing more power to local mayors with a better idea of what their communities need. But talk is cheap.
As for me, I think leaving some cooling towers standing as Graham suggests would stand as a good memorial to the industry. Improving the lives of people living in former coal mining communities would be a better one.