Labour's current lord chancellor, Charles Falconer, provided vital legal advice at the height of the miners' strike 20 years ago to enable the Thatcher government and the National Coal Board to assist the breakup of the National Union of Mineworkers, according to previously secret documents released to the Guardian.
Lord Falconer was engaged in his then role as a barrister to advise Sir Ian MacGregor, brought in to run the coal board, on how to handle miners who defied their union leader, Arthur Scargill.

Lord Falconer told the board how they could safely recognise the breakaway Union of Democratic Mineworkers (UDM), without provoking a legal challenge from the NUM.

The creation of the union led by Roy Lynk, a Nottinghamshire miner, ended the united front by miners against pit closures, and hastened the NUM's demise as an industrial force. The breakaway union was promoted by the Tory government. Documents released under the Freedom of Information Act and now placed in National Archives reveal how the then Mr Falconer's role came into its own between July and October 1985, after the miners had gone back to work.

The NUM national executive and the Nottinghamshire dissidents were involved in a bitter dispute over assets and membership.

Minutes of a private conference between the NCB and Mr Falconer and another barrister show that the barristers stressed it was "fundamental that the Lynk union was not seen to be an [NCB] creation. They considered that the ultimate risk was an action by the national union [NUM] against the board ... it was even more imperative that, if there was any doubt as to whether the Nottingham union was still part of the national union, the board should not be seen to be negotiating with it".

Mr Falconer was an established barrister advising commercial companies. During 20 years at Fountain Court chambers in London, his clients included British Nuclear Fuels, for whom he fought a series of cases against leukaemia patients and Greenpeace activists, and the NCB.

He also advised the Labour party on a number of legal actions. He gave up his commercial law practice when he was made a peer and minister by his longstanding friend Tony Blair in 1997.

Yesterday a spokesman for Lord Falconer confirmed that he had acted for the NCB, but pointed out that at the time the coal board felt they should be able to enter collective bargaining agreements with groups who wanted to negotiate with them, particularly because a majority of the Nottinghamshire miners had effectively left the NUM.

During the pits dispute, most miners in Nottinghamshire carried on working.

Mr Falconer's advice was to keep informal links with Mr Lynk, but not to have formal discussions in case the meeting became public.

In the following months, he and Fountain Court colleagues provided detailed legal advice to the board on how to open talks with the minimum of danger of repercussions from the NUM, even though the new union had yet to have a ballot or made the necessary rule changes. By October, Sir Ian MacGregor took personal responsibility to open negotiations with the union.

David Henke and Rob Evans
The Guardian