Quote: Sal Paradise "He is partly correct - Heath had little option a combination of high oil prices and a work to rule from the miners left stocks short - the NUM wanted 40%+ IIRC and Heath offered 7%'"
Well yes, cause and effect and all that, but the question was asked and that is the correct answer.
I had no time at all for the unions in the 1970s and still view that time as the ultimate in adversary political maneuvering, none of the interested party's came out of the 70s with any self respect left, I have a brother in law who had a good career in prospect working in a modern sea mine who lost everything due to the pig headed positions taken both by his union and by the government of the time, he walked away from his trade disgusted in what he had seen and still holds that opinion.
The breaking of a nationalised industry like the NCB by a union is just pure madness and would not be plausible in a work of fiction.