Ewan MacColl - Daddy What Did You Do In The Strike

[@StephenBetts-nc1wf]

I was a Loyal to the Last Notts Striking Miner. I used to play the Daddy what did you do in the Strike tape in the car as loud as I could, with the windows down. Then watch the scabs walk past with their heads down.

[@stephenmcwilliams5842]

God bless you, Stephen, and your comrades that "stood there on the picket-line unfed".

[@fraserfleming5723]

From the Scottish coal field & in particular Cowdenbeath central Workshops we did our bit & 36 years on I still feel it.

[@RB-jl8gj]

You're a hero.

[@thomasflanagan4280]

History will remember you brother. We’ll never forget.

[@MrConan89]

I worked on the coal face. I was in the "Ted Heath" strike. Fortunately I got out of the industry in 1972. I get the shits with 'folkies' who write songs about mining but never sniffed a piece of coal. Johnny Handle is your man - proper miner/singer/writer.

[@jonathanlloyd4821]

My grandad was forever blacklisted from printing shops after the printing strikes. All Scabs are Bastards

[@mrwilliecowie]

Same here I was put on the Economics League ( never heard of it ) for helping the Golden Wonder crisp factory strike that lasted just under 8 weeks from Corby we travelled to Broxburn to help our fellow workers.

[@jonathanlloyd4821]

@@mrwilliecowie sad to see not much has changed in Britain with how the govt are reacting to strikes of late.

[@zabzab1231]

Couldn't he get work in union shops? Most print shops were closed shops back in my print days

[@ilonacsatlos8228]

Yes my daddy did strike. Yes my daddy did man the picket line too. ♥️

[@stephenmcwilliams5842]

“Daddy, what did you do in the strike?” by Ewan MacColl It was in the year of '84 shit really hit the fan, When 'Mac the Knife' MacGregor, Maggie Thatcher's hatchet-man, Said: “We’ll have to close another twenty pits to meet the plan, And dump another thirty thousand miners”. Daddy, were you in the first of the first? Did you tell the NCB to do its worst? Or did you save your lily liver, Sell the union down the river? A scab, a blackleg, one forever cursed. When Arthur Scargill heard the news, he cried: “This Yankee slob Is a gift from Cowboy Reagan and is here to steal our jobs, Do an axe-job on the union for the crummy Thatcher mob, But we'll show him what it means to be a miner”. Daddy, did you man the picket-line? Did you fight to save the future of the mines? Or did you take the wrong direction, Did you squeal for police protection, Did you let 'em see your India-rubber spine? When the Yorkshire lads came out on strike, they cried: “It's evident The only way to stop MacGregor and the government, Is to bring the lads out everywhere, from Scotland down to Kent, And we'll show 'em what it means to be a miner”. Daddy, did you march at the head? Did you stand there on the picket-line unfed? Or did you sell your mates to have A fortnight on the Costa Brava, Did you choose a two-week holiday instead? Well, the battle it is joined at last, the forces they are massed, On their side the press, the telly, all the weapons of their class, Plus MacGregor and his blacklegs, but we'll never let 'em pass, The NUM's the weapon of the miners. Daddy, what did you do in the strike? Did you scab and let your workmates wage the fight? How the neighbours stood and booed us, Said we had the stink of Judas, Daddy, what did you do in the strike?

[@TheTomhamilton8]

Great

[@Nyckname]

✊✊🏻✊🏼✊🏽✊🏾✊🏿

[@quinnorsomething]

do you have any other songs of this tape? such as 'holy joe from scabsville'?

[@donaldkerr8651]

Sorry, no other songs :(

[@quinnorsomething]

+Donald Kerr do you know anywhere on the Internet that I/we can find them

[@Nyckname]

kzbin.info/www/bejne/mnKknpt_p7mtodk

[@EdwardAveyard]

​​@@quinnorsomething This recording is not from the cassette. It's from a television documentary of MacColl. The cassette that he made for the miners' strike is now very rare. A lot of cassettes are lost to the dustbin of history now. They were not catalogued as vinyl and CDs were.

[@MrConan89]

What did you do in the war Ewan? "I deserted". True. He never wrote a song about it though.

[@RB-jl8gj]

And what were your parents doing ? Going golfing in the Philippines, like you, scab's dog ?

[@biswadipdasgupta4204]

Desertion from an inter-imperialist war is a form of fraternisation with the enemy and to be commended as a form of proletarian internationalism and the transformation of world war to civil war. The enemy, after all (as Karl Liebknecht reminded us in 1914), "is at home".

[@dexterhilluk]

Imagine being one of those people that writes shitty comments online like this…

[@MrConan89]

@@dexterhilluk He deserted. Simple truth.

[@dexterhilluk]

@@MrConan89 deserted as a pacifist… Yh the right thing to do instead of killing young working class men cos they were born on the other side of a made up line… Bored of licking boots are you? Honestly I pity you and your ilk, never being able to see strength and respect it but having to undermine