Scargill facing court battle for London flat

After nearly a year’s wrangling senior figures at the National Union of Mineworkers have lost patience with the former president after failing to resolve the matter and have decided to clarify the issue once and for all.

Mr Scargill, who also owns a large property in Barnsley, was given funding for the three-bedroom Barbican flat in 1982 when he was elected union president.

He stepped down from his position in 2002 but says that the agreement was that the arrangement would continue until his death.

In the past he has said that all of his predecessors have been provided with a house bought by the union both during their time in office and in retirement.

Last year he dismissed a motion put to the annual conference in Blackpool that sought to revisit the arrangement as “complete nonsense” and said it was a “smear story put about by elements of the NUM who have a different view to me about the direction the union should be going in”.

He added: “Every one of my predecessors has been allowed to remain in their properties following retirement.

“There are many people who have two homes. I have a rented property which I shall cease to have when I die and a property which I bought with my own money in Yorkshire.”

But yesterday the union’s general secretary Chris Kitchen said: “It has been just over 12 months since all this came to light and we have not been able to come to an agreement so we are taking legal action to clarify the position.

“The papers have been lodged in the High Court and also served on his London-based firm of solicitors, Finers Stephens Innocent, so now we are in the legal process and Mr Scargill has 14 days for him to decide whether to defend the action or concede.

“There is no doubt that in 1982 Mr Scargill was elected as NUM national president and was provided with accommodation in London.

“That decision was made in accordance with past practice. We were based in London and he was expected to move from Yorkshire. The question is whether we have to provide him with that flat for the remainder of his life.”

As Mr Scargill is 72 the union feels that it has a moral duty to challenge the terms of his employment contract which could see it paying out more than £340,000 over the next decade.

Mr Kitchen added: “Unfortunately, there is a grey area where that decision, (to provide Mr Scargill with a London flat), has found its way into his contract of employment. It has been put in over a number of years.”

He said Mr Scargill’s final contract in 2002 had been amended just a couple of months before his departure in his favour to “vigorously reinforce” the terms regarding the flat.

Mr Kitchen said: “There is no doubt that there was a clause in his contract that it should be paid for by the NUM. Unfortunately, two of the three people involved are no longer with us.

“This is not a witch-hunt against Arthur to turn him out onto the streets but I have got a legal duty and the NEC have a moral duty regarding this because it involves members’ money.

“We don’t want to spend money in the High Court but the arrangement as it stands could easily last another 10 years and £340,000 is a large sum of money. We want to decide it one way or the other.”

Since standing down in 2002 as president of the NUM Mr Scargill has claimed £280,000 for the apartment as well as an annual salary of £34,000.

Helen Mabelis, Mr Scargill’s solicitor at Finers, Stephens and Innocent failed to return phone calls made by the Yorkshire Post yesterday.

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