Introduction: Prospects for British Coal

Abstract

The coal industry has long held a special place and influence in the United Kingdom — among fuels, in industry, in society, and in politics. The nature of that place and influence has been changing rapidly and is expected to change more in the future, not least because of three features: the continuing repercussions of the 1984–85 miners’ strike and the restructuring programmes of the British Coal Corporation (BC); the Conservative Government’s current privatisation of the electricity supply industry (ESI) and its intended future privatisation of BC; and the rise in environmental concern, including concern with acid deposition and the growing issue of carbon dioxide and global warming. The papers in this book evaluate the future prospects for the British coal industry, in the light of critical appraisals of the past performance of BC, of official energy policy formulation and implementation and of the Government’s energy privatisation programmes. Drawing on an unusually broad spectrum of knowledge and experience, the authors include members of both the public and the private sectors of the coal industry, politicians, academic specialists and a head of division in the International Energy Agency.1