'Closing the pit was like taking your legs away'

Ten years since the closure of Hatfield Colliery in Stainforth, the penultimate mine to close in Yorkshire, "people don't forget", says ex-miner Keith Allsopp.

"It's a mining community and grandfathers are telling their grandkids what it was about, so it will never be forgotten in this town. We were betrayed by a government and nobody will ever forget that.

"The pit was the lifeblood of this community. It was a mining town built by a mining company for the miners," he says.

Hatfield Colliery was a deep coal mine that began operating in 1916. From the 1980s onwards it went through several periods of temporary closure before finally closing for good in 2015.

"Closing the pit was like taking your legs away. There's a great comradeship inside a pit.

"If you're a miner and I'm a miner and we work on a coal face, I watch your back and you watch my back.

"When the pit closed it segmented all that and people lost contact with each other," he says.

Stainforth has seen a lot of change over the past decade, but employment rates have remained low.

"There were firms all around Doncaster that supplied collieries. There was a big area of people who were employed supplying the collieries and it all went, so they had to find jobs elsewhere and the miners were forgotten," says Mr Allsopp.

"Possibly it's time to forget it but it will never be forgotten in a town like this."

In 2022, a report from Doncaster Council showed Hatfield and Stainforth had the highest number of economically inactive people in the region.

A warehouse development called Eclipse is now based on the site of the old mine, and there are plans to build a housing estate and factories, but jobs are still in short supply, says Mr Allsopp.

"I thought a big warehouse would mean jobs, but it's all automated.

"When your son leaves school here you don't know if he's going to get a job or not," he says.

Stuart Bolton is a volunteer and trustee at Stainforth 4 All, a charity based at the town's library.

He says Stainforth suffered before the mine closed because it did not receive the financial help other areas were granted by the Coalfields Regeneration Trust.

"All the other pits around Doncaster closed but those communities received financial help. So their towns all developed accordingly," he says.

"Stainforth, because the pit stayed open, did not qualify for any of those funds.

"But there were very few people working there, most of them from outside of Stainforth, so the village has deteriorated because of the lack of investment."

He welcomes development at the mine site.

"I guess it is kind of an icon of the past. It will keep the memory alive, which we want - but let's move forward and develop our community in a sustainable way."

Stephen Cook, who has been a town councillor in Stainforth for 30 years, says things are finally starting to turn around.

"A lot of people were cynical and didn't believe it would happen, but finally things are happening," he says.

"Report after report said Stainforth had deprivation and the community had problems of education and poor health, and you could trace it all back to unemployment caused by the closure of the pit.

"We have been desperate to attract new industry and try to do something about that.

"Now, if you go to the pit top you can see a road has been built into Stainforth, which is excellent for employers.

"This autumn, we have a new housing estate being built, we're going to see the railway station renovated, we're going to see some factories open up there providing work for a wide range of people."

Kerry Lanaghan is a public health improvement officer for Doncaster Council. She runs Shaping Stainforth – a community programme for young people.

She was born and raised in Stainforth and is running an art project to teach children about the area's heritage while looking towards the future.

"We've done a lot of engagement with young people throughout the years," she says.

"What they have said is they would like to know about the pits and learn about their heritage.

"Everything we've done in Stainforth is to represent the miners and what they fought for and the community, and for the young people to have that same respect."

Ms Lanaghan says the same community spirit that surrounded the miners hasn't been lost, and it's something she's keen to pass on to future generations.

"Community spirit has been something we're really proud of in Stainforth, people always rally together in hardships but this is positive.

"It's is so important for them to bring that into the future."

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