"My father still reads the dictionary every day. He says your life depends on your power to master words."

“Waiting in the wings, wishing to chop us to pieces, is Yankee steel butcher MacGregor. This 70-year-old multi-millionaire import, who massacred half the steel workforce in less than three years, is almost certainly brought in to wield the axe on pits. It's now or never for Britain's mineworkers. This is the final chance – while we still have the strength – to save our industry.”

“It is impossible to have workers' control within a capitalist society. Capitalism, by its very nature, produces contradictions which cannot be resolved until and unless we change the system of society...The unions could only have class collaboration and compromise with the mixed economy, and those who advanced the theory of workers' control in present-day society were putting forward an intellectual, Utopian dream, idealistic, unworkable and unattainable.”

“A fight back against this Government's policies will inevitably take place outside rather than inside Parliament. When I talk about 'extra-parliamentary action' there is a great outcry in the press and from leading Tories about my refusal to accept the democratic will of the people. I am not prepared to accept policies elected by a minority of the British electorate. I am not prepared quietly to accept the destruction of the coal industry, nor am I willing to see our social services decimated. This totally undemocratic Government can now easily push through whatever laws it chooses. Faced with possible parliamentary destruction of all that is good and compassionate in our society, extra-parliamentary action will be the only course open to the working class and the Labour movement.”

“Mr Murray would be well advised to direct his attacks towards the Tory Government, who have been devastating our industry and smashing down British industry as a whole. I would remind Mr Murray that the TUC at Congress two years ago voted for extra-Parliamentary action – and in essence political strike action – when it decided to oppose Government laws against the miners...I believe that the miners will recognise, sooner or later, that they will have to stand and defend this industry, their jobs, dignity and self-respect.”

“I believe this judgment should firmly convince any trade unionist that it is useless hoping for justice in the courts of this land. The only way we are going to obtain justice in my view is by fighting for democracy as our forefathers did in establishing the trade union and Labour movements.”

“The miners of this country will now have to seriously consider their position and recognise that at some stage they are going to have to stand and fight in defence of our industry, in defence of our jobs and above all to retain a dignity and respect.”