The cost of apathy in England’s mining towns

The cost of apathy in England’s mining towns

One year ago, as the riots that started in Southport spread across the country, people in the old coalfields started to join in the action. In Wath upon Dearne, a former pit area in the metropolitan borough of Rotherham, rioters clashed with police outside a Holiday Inn Express, leading to some of the most appalling violence of that summer. The hotel’s residents, housed there by the Home Office while it processed their asylum claims, said they f…