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Scargill faces union in court over perks row
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FORMER miners’ leader Arthur Scargill is suing his own union in a row over perks - claiming damages of up to £50,000.
Mr Scargill is taking legal action at Sheffield County Court against the National Union of Mineworkers, claiming he is owed more than £15,000 towards the cost of a car, as well as payment of other benefits including phone bills.
The 74-year-old, who retired as the union’s honorary president last December, believes he should have been given the money under his old employment contract. The court heard Mr Scargill ‘thought his legal entitlements were being trodden on’ when the union’s Yorkshire Area Trust Fund offered him just £50 towards a car in January 2011. He was hoping to receive 80 per cent of the cost of a Ford Mondeo.
He also wants the fund to pay his landline and mobile phone bills – an allowance that was stopped in April 2010 – alongside costs and interest.
Mr Scargill was president of the NUM until 2002, and led the union during the year-long miners’ strike from 1984 to 1985.
But in 2010 he was told he no longer qualified for full financial membership.
The court heard he was asked to supply the fund with a list of the duties he performed for them, after telling them he needed the car for union work.
James Laddie, representing the NUM, said Mr Scargill prepared a document but didn’t send it to the union.
“What this document shows is that there are large periods when you appeared to conduct no work at all on behalf of the Yorkshire Area Trust Fund, or the Yorkshire Area,” Mr Laddie said.
“You had to dredge through your records and your memory to show what you had actually done.”
Mr Scargill replied that he had done more work for the union divisions than ‘any other official in history’.
He said he regularly spent six days a week working 10-hour days in his office dealing with union business including legal cases.
Mr Scargill’s contract entitled him to assistance towards the cost of a car ‘at intervals of not less than two years’, at an amount to be decided by union trustees.
Mr Scargill – who lives at Worsbrough Bridge in Barnsley and leads the Socialist Labour Party – signed the contract after retiring in 2002, putting him on a pay grade normally worth around £26,000.
He is also embroiled in a separate High Court dispute with the NUM over a £1.5 million London flat.
The case continues.
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Comments
There are 38 comments to this article
Page 1 of 3
Reason
Thursday, February 23, 2012 at 10:57 AMFunny how my last piece is still pending moderation after 24 hours, probably because I made a flippant remark about dropping Scargill down one of the disused mineshafts due to his greed and shafting the miners even still ....but Bigmarts comments about hoping that Maggie dies soon is left on.....are we seeing the real Sheffield Star for once....perhaps it should be the Star and Sickle??
Reason
Wednesday, February 22, 2012 at 12:13 PMComment removed by moderator
BigMart
Tuesday, February 21, 2012 at 06:41 AMYeah, bring back Maggie then we could all watch her wet herself on live TV. Now that really would be worth watching. Evil old hag, not long now you wicked cow.
1graybags
Monday, February 20, 2012 at 01:50 PMBring back Maggie, she may now be nuts, but she'd have a good go at sorting the mess the country is in after the mess left by the thick socialist liberal left Liebour morons. and she'd not worry about treading on a few toes.
hilltopblade
Sunday, February 19, 2012 at 07:38 AMPost 33 (swfc) - never thought I would agree with a wednesday fan. You talk common sense mate, I wondered as a kid why they were called the 'loony left' not anymore ! The trouble is there are too many sovietised folk (Ill vote labour cus my dad did and his dad before). They have done more damage with immigration etc and folk need to wake up
swfc
Saturday, February 18, 2012 at 10:53 PMbigmart, you are a sick thing, how can you wish anybody dead? very sick, call me a pig fan idiot way of getting your point across, the sooner you realise she warned about the EU, you will see that job loss is down to the eu, yep used to see loads of eu plated trucks in the 80s and lines of non uk citizens taking housing and claiming very penny going, yes who broker the amount people getting made redundant got stopes to 10% of what you got under thatcher? labour... you will be saying she was a butcher for kicking the argies of the falklands next! bigmart but not smart you should look into politics a bit further and see what she did was coming, labour privatised schools,army,hospitals, police,councils, in fact labour privatised , privatise. so grow up read facts and think further than your left wing up bringing..
BigMart
Saturday, February 18, 2012 at 09:18 PMswfc, you're not the brightest really are you? Pig fan pretty much says it all, but your allegiance to the incontinent incoherent hag is worrying. "Maggie's" vision of the future is truly coming to fruition, toe the line or you're sacked. Work for a pitance and if you don't like it, tough, there are enough unemployed out there to strike sufficient fear into you so that you'll put up with any old sh1te. Sorry, she is the devil incarnate and the day she dies will be a day to rejoice, just a pity that the scumbag left such a legacy and that there are still enough fools out there who belive that she did a good job.
swfc
Saturday, February 18, 2012 at 07:49 PMbigmart etc, off your heads, maggie put out a vision of the future where the EU would rule over the UK and will take our money and break the country, scargil was a porn in this game, if he was a smart union rep he would have took all the miners down to London and blocked the Capitol , scab bashing was worth nothing, their was no shortage of coal or chance of when the strike was on, thatcher could see the future and all you who are saying thatcher ruined Yorkshire well wrong wrong and wrong we have been under the red flag in Sheffield and surrounding areas for decades, and the labour government did more privatising then any government before them, immigration. went up by millions because of Blair the true scum bag prime minister, we are over run by leeches from far and wide sucking the life out of our society the EU is causing the UK untold debt problems all from labour! so when you say about thatcher remember it's thatcher who said this would happen and it was thatcher who went to the eu and said give me my money back, so scargil is correct and I hope he wins money of the num but he is no different to any other person he wants money, and during the strike he never had to worry about his mortgage or his meals, non of the num board did, all you mugs make unions millions a year, paying your money each week, only use the left wing to get votes and get money. unions can't do nothing against the EU nothing at all, under the conservatives it would take ten grand plus to make you redundant under labour your getting one week for each year worked, this making it easy to get rid of staff, thatcher won in the end as she got proved correct she could see it coming,
hilltopblade
Saturday, February 18, 2012 at 05:58 PMBig mart - I respect your opinion but i feel the left wing partys have done far moe damage. Fact 'new' labour flooded us with immigrants who have put massive strain on various aspects of this country, in many cases failing to integrate and even hating us. according to migration watch (set up by tony blair) 90 % of all jobs created in past ten years have gone to foreigners and its driven down the average working mans wage. they did more damage to this country and its workforce than thatcher ever could. incidently you didnt reply re - 70's strikes, dead un buried, imf begging bowl cus they spent money we didnt have ? interested to hear your views. history never changes, labour just left us well in it again, torys to bail us out.
BigMart
Saturday, February 18, 2012 at 04:35 PMOh and as for Arthur being a socialist? Being a socialist doesn't mean that you shouldn't try to better yourself, Arthur did legions for the working man of this country, far more than most, I don't begrudge him a single penny.
BigMart
Saturday, February 18, 2012 at 04:33 PMSome of us chose to believe the bull in the tory controlled media of the time, some didn't. I guess you did. She single handedly destroyed the industrial base of this country, may she rot in hell for that.
hilltopblade
Saturday, February 18, 2012 at 07:18 AMPost 26 - Arthur is such a socialist he has arranged for luxury flat, payment of phone bills, wants a car courtesy of num etc etc not very socialist to me. puts the bankers to shame. Like any other socialist, if the opportunity to get the snought in the trough they will do. as for ferel problems - that is because of liberal left of sensible parties who are to do gooding for their own good.we just had years of the labour party making people un accountable for their actions and rewarding them as well. Thatcher inherited a terrible mess from the callaghan labour govt - remember 'labour isnt working' mass strikes, dead unburied and again spending money we didnt have - what she did was got us going again.
BigMart
Friday, February 17, 2012 at 10:02 PMArthur Scargill is the greatest living Yorkshireman bar none. He was visionary enough to see what the evil b@stard Thatcher was up to, and he and his men stood up to her. The society that we now live in, the one of no respect, where no one is safe and where drug addled feral kids rule the roost is one that came about because the miners lost. Thatcher ruined the industrial base of this country, her and Reagan created nations based on greed. Pay Arthur his dues, then let's all laugh at that evil bitch Thatcher who can't even control her bowels any more. Die in agony you witch, you really do deserve it.
1graybags
Friday, February 17, 2012 at 09:15 PManybody notice how the only MP's sent to prison for actually fiddling their expenses were Liebour. 2 Jags Prescott, ex PM for rent Blair and now the other Milliband (who actually won the leadership) has took a job with a city bank. Say what you like about Thatcher but you can't call her a hypocrite like these Liebour. Liebour the party of jealousy until they get the chance to pocket a few bob.
Halfway Lad
Friday, February 17, 2012 at 07:07 PMGreed is Good!!!! For how many years have the likes of Scargill, Prescott and Skinner banged the drum for the lowering of the retirement age? Yet we find that even when well into their seventies their personal greed is still not satisfied, MPs salaries, Union sponsorships, Legal disputes and even Lordships, what more do these unqualified charaltans want, they are hungry when their fat guts are full. Only the grim reaper will terminate their avarice.
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