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During the 1980s Margaret Thatcher's government attempted to reduce the economic power of the industrial working class by legislating against the trade unions and defeating the 1984–85 Miners' Strike, which saw her brand the miners as the 'enemy within'. At the time English football was an important part of male working-class culture, particularly for northern industrial workers and was coming under attack from the Government and press over football hooliganism. It has often been argued that Thatcher's trade union policies were designed to break the economic power of the industrial working class. If, through comparison, a link between this policy and the treatment of football supporters is found it will determine whether this conflict had a cultural aspect. Scholars have anecdotally made this link previously, but there has not been sufficient analysis of the comparison. This treatment will not analyse any actual links between the trade union movement and football supporters, but will focus on the Government and press treatment of football and trade unions and assess whether the Government was seeking to bind the two issues together. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The political thought of trade unionists has been largely neglected in labour history. This study addresses that deficiency by analysing the values and philosophy of the Birmingham brassworker, W. J. Davis, between the general elections of 1892 and 1906. Although Lib-Lab trade unionism has been frequently dismissed as reactionary and hostile to independent labour representation, Davis was a far more radical and flexible politician than has been characterized. His beliefs were underpinned by a strong conviction that the working-class community was the ideal model for British politics and society at large. Traditional trade unionist principles of cooperation, solidarity, and interdependence were the inspiration for Davis' desire for independent labour representation, and not the obstacle. Davis would not sacrifice workers' interests for the sake of ideological purity and was therefore prepared to collaborate with both middle-class Liberals and socialists to achieve his aims, whilst never losing sight of his distinctive working-class identity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]