""I knew you'd come up wth all that paranoid shit about labour movement and trade unions who were just trying to stop their members being shit on from a great height, and have probably given you every material advantage that you enjoy. i tried to forestall it - but you've come up with it again.If you have no gratitude or sense of history, or respect for the Tolpuddle Martyrs and the striking miners of Scargill's time- in my eyes you're a bit of fool, and have been taken in by the toffs who write the history books.""

Sometimes you're a bit of a twit mate. How young do you think I am?

I'm not reading from history. I WAS THERE!

Having changed direction and taken an apprenticeship to qualify as a carpenter/joiner and wood machinist, it took methree years to get work in that trade. WHY? Fucking trade unions refused to recognise that I was newly qualified, and wouldn't allow me to work, in any of their closed shop domains.

During those three years I worked for Southern Water, cleaning sewers, so don't tell me I owe respect or gratitude to the trade union movement.

I remember the days of the Attlee govrnment when the trade unions dealt fairly with management, and I remember the lies and the intransigent stupidity of your hero Scargill, who led his members by the nose into a strike lasting a year, after which they got exactly what they would have had if they'd ignored him.

Scargill did more to destroy the unions than Thatcher ever could, innocent people died, families were ripped apart, and I should be grateful for that. Dream on laddie!

Don T.