Striking coal mining museum workers receive visit from Arthur Scargill

The museum was forced to close when the workers walked out today and they were joined on the picket line by Arthur Scargill, former President of the National Union of Mineworkers.

The strike is set to run until Sunday, October 30.

The charity which runs the Wakefield museum said it has offered employees a pay rise which “equates to 6.8 per cent for the lowest paid”.

But Unison said workers are not prepared to accept a rise that is significantly below inflation, which recently hit 10.1 per cent, as they are struggling with the cost-of-living crisis and some are claiming benefits to supplement their incomes.

Former coal miners who now work as guides at the museum claim their hourly pay has increased by just £1.16 since 2008, to £10.35.

According to the charity, it cannot make a higher offer this year because there are restrictions imposed by the Government, which provides the majority of the museum’s funding, but union officials say there is “no evidence of this”

Museum guide Eric Richardson, who was a miner for 50 years, said: “We aren’t asking for a massive pay rise, we want something the museum can afford.

“We need it, due to inflation. We all go to the same supermarkets and the same garages to fill up our cars.”

Speaking on the picket line, he added: “We don’t want to be here.

“That (the museum) is where we want to be. We enjoy it and we’re all miners who want to pass on our experiences to the public and schoolchildren.

“We don’t want to be forced into taking industrial action.”

He also said the museum owners should look at the hourly wages of each worker, rather than introducing a blanket rise, as that would “widen the gap” between the lowest and highest earners.

Another guide, who asked to remain anonymous, said: "I think they have been getting away with giving us low pay rises for too long. Enough is enough.

“Inflation is now running at 10 per cent and it’s unrealistic to expect us to keep losing money like this.”

He added: “For the mining community, this is our heritage. We don’t want to do anything to hurt the museum.

“We don’t want to be sitting around here either, we want to pass our knowledge on and teach children about our heritage.”

In a statement, the charity which runs the museum said it “cares about the welfare of its staff” and has already offered them a pay rise.

It added: “We value the contribution of our people enormously and the sum of the proposal takes us to the maximum allowed within the Government Pay Remit.

“We still hope that this situation can be resolved, particularly as the strike is timed for school holidays which will deny our visitors, many of them children, the chance to hear the story of mining.”

The Yorkshire Mining Museum opened on the site of the former Caphouse Colliery in 1988 and then became a national museum in 1995.