Letter: Applause all the way for miners

Sir: I have just returned from my lunch hour, spent on a street corner in Kensington applauding the thousands marching in today's TUC/miners demonstration.

What impressed me most was not the miners waving thanks to the onlookers, nor the miners' smiling wives and children marching with them, nor the enthusiastic groups from other TUC organisations, nor the klaxon bursts of passing fire engines, nor the constant sympathetic beeping of car horns, nor the people waving support from office windows; but the people on the street pavements stopping and clapping their hands. They were mostly women: young, well-dressed managers, shopping housewives and secretaries.

For today, I did what I could. Thankfully, I still have a job, though it is in the construction industry and therefore by no means safe. The Government should listen to the real message of today's event: the whole country, not just the miners, is afraid for the future.

Yours faithfully,

DOUGLAS EVANS

London, NW6

21 October