Tyrone O'Sullivan: Death of miners' leader who led pit buyout

As branch secretary of the NUM, Tyrone O'Sullivan led the buyout of Tower Colliery, extending its life by 13 years

Tributes have been paid to a "legendary" Welsh miners' leader following his death at the age of 77.

Tyrone O'Sullivan led the miners' buyout of Tower Colliery in Rhondda Cynon Taf, the last deep pit in Wales.

Workers used their redundancy money and marched back to work in 1995, a year after the mine near Hirwaun had closed.

First Minister Mark Drakeford called him "a giant, in every sense, of the Labour movement and a great figure in the history of Wales in our own time".

During the miners' strike of 1984-85, he was a flying picket, quickly mobilising busloads of miners to join the picket line at various collieries.

"We had to fight the fight," he said in a BBC Wales interview in January.

Tyrone O'Sullivan at a rally in Merthyr Tydfil in 2016 before an appearance by then Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn

"It's a wonderful feeling, and strikes give you that feeling. Win, lose or draw you still fought the battle."

As branch secretary of the National Union of Mineworkers (NUM), he led the buyout of Tower, extending its life for a further 13 years.

Mr Drakeford said he was "deeply saddened" by the death of a man who was "an instinctive practitioner of practical socialism, he leaves his legacy in the lives he affected, the hope he radiated and the utter determination with which he pursued the causes which mattered most to those on whose behalf he worked with such dedication".

Labour Cynon Valley MP Beth Winter called Mr O'Sullivan "a hero" of the Labour and trade union movements.

She said: "He had the vision for a better society, and he still had that fighting spirit, a vision for a society for more of the people of the communities, a socialist vision."

His death, Ms Winter said, was "a big loss to us".

Ann Clwyd, who was MP for Cynon Valley for 35 years before retiring in 2019, described Mr O'Sullivan as "my big pal, my best buddy".

"Tyrone inspired the miners to fight with his passion," she said. "I pass on my deepest condolences to all his family."

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Gower MP Tonia Antoniazzi said he was a "towering figure of trade unionism and the Labour movement".

"Since getting elected, I have been proud to know Tyrone as a warm, sincere and intelligent member of Gower CLP [Constituency Labour Party]," she tweeted.

Rhondda Cynon Taf council leader Andrew Morgan tweeted that he had known Mr O'Sullivan for more than 30 years and was "very sorry to hear... the legend of Tower Colliery has passed away".

Cardiff Central MP Jo Stevens tweeted that he was a "a legendary south Wales miner and trades unionist whose story will continue to be told for years to come".

Tyrone O'Sullivan at the closing ceremony of Tower Colliery in 2008

'Shook the system'

Tower was taken on by 239 staff, each pooling £8,000 redundancy to buy it after closure in 1994.

Speaking in 2015, he said the takeover "shook the system" because the pit made in excess of £11m profit in the first three years.

Mr O'Sullivan described its eventual closure in 2008 as a day of celebration, not mourning.

Mr Morgan said Mr O'Sullivan was later involved in work to revive the site and "secure a deal" for a zip line visitor attraction.

Pontypridd MP Alex Davies-Jones described Mr O'Sullivan as a "bastion of trade unionism, the Labour Party and south Wales".

"He told me, 'never forget and always keep fighting'," she tweeted.

Kim Howells, a former Labour MP for Pontypridd and south Wales NUM official said he and Mr O'Sullivan were "both Aberdare boys".

He said Mr O'Sullivan was "somebody who was very, very keen on the idea of education extending to everyone - whether they worked in Tower Colliery or a factory or anywhere else".

"As far as he was concerned, those opportunities should be there for everyone and, indeed, he worked very hard to try and ensure they were," he told BBC Radio Wales' Sunday Supplement.

"We thought ourselves as something special, believe me, from Aberdare and Tower Colliery… and what the boys did there… was a natural extension of that determination to fight for what we considered to be right."

Conservative MP Sir John Redwood, who was Welsh secretary when Tower Colliery was sold to the workers, said he admired Mr O'Sullivan "very much" and that he had endorsed the miners' takeover.

"It proved it would have been a much better model generally if anyone had done that in other pits around England as well as Wales," he added.

"I've always believed in enterprise capitalism but I've always liked the variant of it where the workers are the owners."

Welsh Conservative Senedd group leader Andrew RT Davies said: "Tyrone's life was defined by his passion and dedication to the south Wales valleys, which will be remembered for generations to come".