I blame Thatcher. If she hadn't shut the pits he could have worked over here and still played.

Hard economic sense, when there are large scale redundancies in a old declining industry you move to look for jobs in a modern expanding sector.

East Asian countries like China, Japan and South Korea have a large demand for coal and iron ore imports and Australia has tapped this market making large scale exports every year to these countries.

The problem with the UK is you have vested interests in declining sectors like banking and financial services expecting the taxpayer to prop them up rather than face up to the fact these industries are in decline.

What we need is a modern day version of Mrs Thatcher to get the economy by the scruff of its neck and say no more subsidies for these industries that can't stand up for themselves, instead we should be focusing on the industries of the future like coal mining. I know you will get bankers etc bleating about "losing jobs" but why should the taxpayer pay them benefits....they can retrain for the new industries and learn to work down the pit.

The UK has 1000 years worth of coal under its soil so why not tap this export market?

As Ben Jeffries is showing if you don't offer the right incentives to highly skilled workers they will simply go overseas.

He's gone from the Curry Bulls, to the Kurri Bull (dogs)...

*tumbleweed*

Well that would be enough to get me overseas..

Interesting logic from the poster bringing politics into the thread on Jeffries, but I think to bemoan the current under utilisation of UK coal reserves in the same breath as saying we need another Thatcher shows a certain lack of understanding of who it was that closed the UK coal industry in the first place! Do we think they possibly weren't born in 1984?

I'm pretty sure Sally's post was satire.

This should be mandatory reading for all Trolls. I have read it several times now and still can't tell whether it is serious or not.

According to Twitter Ian Sibbit is retiring at the end of this season.

Thatcher had the balls to stand up to unions that were trying to hold the country to ransom, in those days the situation was different, coal mines were losing money and needing subsidies, the unions were expecting the taxpayer to bail them out, like the bankers do now. And with weakass figures like Cameron in charge thats what they get.

What we need is someone with balls like Thatcher to stand up to the banks say to them "No, No, No", if coal exports is a growing market then thats what the state should be focusing on, and for people that lose their jobs in banking its up to them to seek work in that sector, and not expect the state to let them carry on working in their unprofitable industries.

So what if that means that you get more inequality, the Aussies don't care about people getting rich from mining coal? If everyone in Yorkshire and the North East working the pits gets rich then good for them, their wealth will trickle down to help the poor in the non mining regions like the south.

You sure about that?

Any more posts like this and you'll need that American Football helmet you use as an avatar. What on earth this has to do with Rugby League ? Trickle down indeed.