Redundant miners hang around the street, West Calder

Jan. 10 What will they do with the redundant colliers? Livelihood of West Calder cut off with shutdown of mine. The future looks bleak for Scottish coal miners, and the bleakest spot of all today is the West Calder district. Baads was a good pit, they say, But no-one wants to buy the coal'. So a few weeks back it was closed down for good, and with it went the only livelihood West Calder has ever known. This place is going to be a ghost town in one year from now has become the favourite phrase of the redundant miners. There is no work in the area, and for unskilled men of limited talents, very little in the whole of the South of Scotland. A few mines in England are looking for men, but they don't seem keen enough to look in West Calder, and anyway most of the baads discards can't afford to go South. Anyway, they say, Where would we live'. So, for the meantime, they just hang around the streets, hopeful that someone might hit town with a list of men wanted. The main street of West Calder is bleak at the best of times - today it is even more so. The wives aren't around the shops, and the men stand around in groups waiting till it's time to go to the labour exchange

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