By the way, whoever these "certain people/sections/unions," (you chose not to specify), has#d any of them broke the law, the police were perfectly entitled to arrest them, charge them, place restriction orders on them, bind them over to keep the peace.... a host of legal actions they were entitled to take, which they never did.
Had the situation got out of hand, they were entitled to apply for a state of emergency to be declared - it never was.
The repressive, provocative and violent behaviour was entirely a decision taken by the police from the beginning of the strike.
Had the police not been regarded as above the law and answerable only to their own superiors they would have been prosecuted for violent and unruly behaviour - they never where.
Thatcher used the police as a dictator uses them, as a private army to achieve political ends
Just as her friend Pinochet, she was prepared to use the army in the same way - as recently revealed documents have shown
Jim Carroll