Union boss guilty of stealing from miners’ charity

FORMER president of the Union of Democratic Mineworkers Neil Greatrex was today found guilty at Nottingham Crown Court of stealing thousands of pounds from a miners’ care home charity.

Greatrex was accused of stealing money from Phoenix Nursing and Residential Home Ltd, a subsidiary company of the UDM charity Nottinghamshire Miners Home.

He was found guilty of 14 theft charges relating to money stolen to settle invoices from two building companies and a joiner amounting to a total of £148,628.83.

Hide Ad
Hide Ad

UDM general secretary Mick Stevens, who was accused of the same charges, was cleared by the jury at Nottingham Crown Court.

The men were trustees of the charity and the subsidiary company. They were able to sign cheques on its behalf, the court has heard.

It was alleged they billed the charity-run home for improvement work which was actually being done on their own properties, including an £11,750 kitchen and other building and landscaping work.

Greatrex, of Shepherd’s Lane, Stanley, previously told the trial that Phoenix had paid for a new kitchen for his home but that he had taken this in lieu of a salary to which he believed he was entitled.

Hide Ad
Hide Ad

He also said all other payments for improvements to his home had been paid by cash.

Regarding Phoenix, Greatrex told the court: “It was a standalone company. Nothing to do with the charitable status of the home.”

He added: “I believed I was entitled to a reasonable salary and expenses from the Phoenix for the work that I was doing for the Phoenix.”

But co-director Stevens today told the court he himself did not expect a salary and that he was unaware Greatrex had.

Hide Ad
Hide Ad

He also denied any knowledge of Greatrex having taken a kitchen in lieu of a salary.

The court heard one of the charity rules was that none of the trustees should take any benefit from it.

As directors of the trading subsidiary, neither defendant was allowed to take money from that, the prosecution said.

Greatrex spent more than 20 years in the National Union of Mineworkers before forming the UDM in 1985.

Hide Ad
Hide Ad

He became a controversial figure for speaking out against NUM president Arthur Scargill’s tactics in the 1985 strikes.

He formed the UDM claiming that nobody was speaking out for Nottinghamshire miners, prompting a great split between workers.

In an interview on the UDM website he said his own father did not talk to him for six years after the strike.

Related topics: