'Our miners' pension injustice has been put right'

"Over the moon".

That's the overriding feeling of Alan Gascoyne, describing his long wait to receive a pension scheme payout, after years of campaigning.

But there is also a deep sadness for him, for the thousands of former miners who did not live long enough to see the day.

"It's terrible in some ways because in our scheme, around about 5,000 to 6,000 former miners in this pension scheme die each year," says Mr Gascoyne, a Mineworkers' Pension Scheme trustee for Derbyshire and Nottinghamshire.

"We're all getting on now, and any delays to payments, even if it's a month, that's 400 members who won't see it."

Chancellor Rachel Reeves confirmed in her first Budget that former miners will receive a total of £1.5bn that has been kept from their pensions since the privatisation of British Coal in 1994.

The government said 8,800 miners in Derbyshire, 8,500 in Nottinghamshire and just under 1,700 in Leicestershire would receive on average an extra £116 a month in their pension.

Mr Gascoyne, who worked at Shirebrook Colliery in Derbyshire from 1978 until its closure in 1993, said his members would begin to receive the money at the end of November.

Speaking from the town's miners' welfare club, he said it was a "relief" the wait was finally over.

"We were over the moon when we heard, it means a lot that they've committed to it," he said.

"This is something that thousands of ex-miners have never had - to receive the pay increase in these times is marvellous.

"It's been an injustice, and it's been put right - this is money that's been owed to us for a long time.

"Fair play to the Labour government, they put it in the manifesto, and they've done it."

The pension scheme benefits tens of thousands of families, primarily in the North East of England, South Wales, Yorkshire, and East Midlands.

It was taken over by the government when British Coal was privatised in 1994 under Prime Minister John Major.

The agreement was struck between the then-Conservative government and the scheme's trustees in exchange for a government guarantee that the value of mineworkers' pensions would not decrease.

But in March, the BBC revealed more than £420m had been obtained by the government in the past three years.

The previous Conservative government had said the scheme was fair and beneficial, but former mineworkers and their families have continued to campaign.

Mr Gascoyne, 69, said it was an "ongoing fight for many years" but mentioned Doncaster North MP Ed Miliband, now the energy secretary, and Stephanie Peacock, MP for Barnsley South, as some who "kicked it into gear".

The former National Union of Mineworkers' (NUM) branch secretary said the issue got wider attention when the treasury select committee published a report in 2021 looking further at the scheme.

"We gave evidence at that inquiry... the government have had £4.7bn, and we've paid for the guarantee and some," Mr Gascoyne said.

"That injustice was highlighted in that committee and rightly said, 'pay it back'... but [the government] didn't."

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