It's 40 years ago since one of the most bitter industrial disputes in British history, and it had a major impact on many workers and families in West Fife.

Throughout the coming months, we'll look back at how the miners' strike was reported in the Press, continuing with 'Rallying Support', news of a major strike rally to be held in the town (March 23, 1984):

Dunfermline Press:

MINERS from throughout the Scottish Coalfield will converge on Dunfermline tomorrow (Saturday) to attend the country's first major strike rally in the action which by yesterday had closed most of the British pits.

The presence of the NUM Vice-President and Scottish President, Mr Mick McGahey, is sure to attract large numbers of men from Fife pits alone.

The provisional programme for the rally is a march through the town, followed by a 'High Noon' mass meeting in Pittencrieff Park's Glen Pavilion.

The marchers will set off from the Glen Gates around 10.30 am. They will follow a pipe band along High Street, circle the town, and return to the Park.

Both Dunfermline's MPs, Mr Dick Douglas and Dr Gordon Brown, are expected to speak from the platform, as will Fife Regional Council Convener, Councillor R. Gough, and Mr Ron Curran,
a senior official of NUPE.

Contingents of miners from the doomed Polmaise Colliery and Bogside Mine will also attend the rally.

NUM Scottish secretary, Mr Erie Clark, said Mr McGahey and other senior officials will attend as many meetings and rallies as possible throughout Scotland.

READ MORE: How the Press reported the start of the strike

The rally is being organised by the NUM in conjunction with Fife Federation of Trades Council, who, at a meeting earlier this week, heard complaints of miners being turned back by the Police while heading for picket duty in England.

Seafield NUM delegate, Mr John Neilson, Lochgelly, told the meeting how five cars from Fife had been turned back at Ashington.

The Federation agreed to make complaints "in the strongest possible terms" to Scottish Secretary, Mr George Younger, to Shadow Scottish Secretary, Mr Donald Dewar, and to all Fife MPs.

A Dunfermline miner, Comrie Branch Chairman, Mr Bob Young, described to the Press how he and three companions in a car had been turned back by the Police on Sunday.

"We stopped to ask directions at a pit in Northumberland. The Police asked who we were and where we were going. When we told them, they told us to get back, or get lifted.

"What worries me is that it could have been anyone in that car, going to any place in Britain. To me, the Government is simply using the Police to break the miners' strike."

Mr Young, who is also Chairman of the Committee of the Rights Office, Dunfermline, has spent much of the week working with ROD staff in the mining communities.

READ MORE: Dunfermline Press reports on miners' 'All-Out Battle'

He said: "We have helped hundreds of miners and their wives to understand the benefits that are available to them, and helped them fill in forms. Those miners whose wives work full or part time aren't too badly off at the moment.

"But, in the case of a miner whose wife doesn't work, and they have two kids, he receives £21.45 benefit for his wife and £18.30 for the children. From this is deducted £15 strike pay, which we are not receiving, and he also loses £13 child benefit."

Mr Young said food was being made available at the Miners' Institutes in High Valleyfield, Oakley and Woodmill, Dunfermline.

In Central Fife, hot food is being made available at Cowdenbeath Institute and at the Minto Club, Lochgelly, for miners and their families.

Longannet Power Station was the scene of some of the largest-scale NUM picketing this week.

Around 80 miners gathered at the gates of the West Fife station on Tuesday morning, the numbers rising to about 200 yesterday (Thursday) morning.

Dunfermline Press:

However, the mass picket was quickly called off, leaving only a token force, after apparently successful talks with the T&GWU.

The talks were precipitated by events on Tuesday, when the pickets were unable to prevent the entry and exit of large numbers of contractors' lorries from as far afield as Airdrie and Ayrshire.

Pickets from the Cowdenbeath-Lochgelly area have been on duty 24 hours a day in an attempt to stop trains and lorries transporting coal from Westfield opencast site to Longannet.

An SSEB spokesman said on Wednesday: "Between 60 and 70 pickets are outside Longannet this morning and have been speaking to lorry drivers. The power station is functioning normally."

The spokesman could not comment on the lorries arriving and leaving the station. Asked about coal stocks at Longannet, he replied: "We have ample stocks at all power stations."

The NUM has set up a number of soup kitchens to keep pickets supplied with hot food, and also to help families suffering particular hardship.

Dunfermline Press, March 23, 1984