In south Wales the greater proportion of colliery tips were removed in the decade following the Aberfan disaster in 1966. Tip removals / landscaping from the 1980s onwards were, in comparison, more of a mopping-up exercise. The degree of public outcry in south Wales about tips following Aberfan was, understandably, enormous.
The great majority of shafts in south Wales were filled / capped by the NCB long before EU money was available, and the decision to fill major shafts was made by the NCB. By the 1970s this was such a mainstream activity of the NCB that they produced a lengthy instruction manual on how to fill and cap shafts.
Reverting to north east Wales, it has long struck me as one of the UK coalfields whose local authorities have tried the hardest (and largely succeeded) in removing almost every trace of the former mining industry and in reinventing the area as an extension of the economically prosperous Chester / Cheshire / etc region. I suspect that the Bersham Colliery shale tip is probably widely perceived in north east Wales as the last major coal mining blot on the area's landscape waiting to be removed.
the was no onus on the then NCB to clear /make safe any tips, the legislation of the time the 1954 mines and quarries act had very little to say about HAS apart from fencing old workings, the act was amended in 69 to include waste spoil and little was done till the health and safety act of 1974, it was the thatcher government that applied and got the remaining dumps removed from aberfan, along with the then minister for wales who coughed up the cash, not on health and safety reasons, but as he put it, "that they constitute a psychological, emotional danger"dump removal was not wide spread in the 70s compared with the 80s, it was more of a case of working with the FC to plant a few trees which they also did at aberfan
comparing pit closures in the 70s to the 80s is ridiculous a hundred and thirty odd closed in the seventies and 60s for very different reasons,the 60s and 70s saw pit closures because man power was lacking, relative very good prospects in other industries, close by, and the concentration on super pits not just in south wales but across the uk, the long life pits in south wales at this time were struggling to find men, and new pits and recommissioning pits was still happening, the whole sale destruction of mining in wales in the 80s was political, the men thought for there livelihoods, and there children's livelihoods , the employment prospects had dramatically changed over a decade,they could not just jump into another industry as before,
The tip`s above Aberfan,Merthyr Vale Colliery tips,were cleared by money out of the Disaster fund,No minister coughed up the money,and the money was returned many year`s later after Ron Davies fought for many year`s for this injustice to be settled.
The tip`s were cleared around the time the A470 was built.
no they were not the disaster fund contributed it was the government of the day through the minister and the NCB who cleared the dump
In the Commons debate on the Inquiry Report it was asserted by the Government (on the advice of the NCB and supported by comments in the Tribunal report) that the remaining tips above Aberfan were not dangerous and did not warrant removal (estimated by the Tribunal to cost £3m), but merely required landscaping (a much cheaper option).[18] This was promptly contradicted by the local MP;[18] as Margaret Thatcher pointed out the report noted that "One may conclude that No. 5" (tip) "has been standing and is standing at a very low factor of safety." Despite the initial Government opposition, public pressure led to a decision to remove the remaining tips: the Secretary of State for Wales stressed however, that they were safe but that he knew from his contacts with the people of Aberfan "that they constitute a psychological, emotional danger".[25] If the tips were not physically dangerous, Robens saw no obligation on the NCB to pay the full cost of their removal. The government made a grant of £200,000 to the NCB towards the cost of removing the tips,[26] and under "intolerable pressure" from the government, the Trustees of the Disaster Fund agreed to contribute £150,000. At the time, the Charity Commission made no objection to this action, but it has subsequently been criticised as "unquestionably unlawful" under charity law.[27]