When the miners returned to work in March 1985, two things made them more bitter than they might otherwise have been. They left some seven hundred sacked men at home and eighty odd in prison. Shortly after the return, a ballot asking for a fifty pence weekly levy of all National Union of Mineworkers members tb support the sacked and imprisoned men was defeated. It was argued by some that the men in prison needed political support, and it was no longer sufficient for the union to simply raise money. Since that time the National Union of Mineworkers has found the money to carry on its business despite the sequestration of its funds. A political campaign for the prisoners has not, however, materialised.