‘Land we paid for is being sold for millions – but we don’t see the benefit’

In 2023, a group of cross-party MPs published a report, external on levelling up former coalfield communities, which criticised CISWO and recommended it should outline its strategic direction to clarify its aims and objective, to allow for better scrutiny.

CISWO’s chief executive, Nicola Didlock, said at the time she was “profoundly disappointed” by the findings and in January 2025 told the BBC the report was “riddled with” inaccuracies.

A survey commissioned by the BBC last year, 40 years on from the 1984 miners’ strike, suggested 73% of people living in former mining towns and villages felt they had seen little or no progress on levelling up.

Former miner David Smith, from Dinnington, who was part of a local group which tried to stop the sale of a playing field, says he sees a “pattern” of CISWO “taking money out” of mining areas.

CISWO sold Dinnington’s “hallowed” old miners’ clubhouse and land to housing developers, for £875,000, in 2020. It said the recreation ground had been empty since 2008.

It said it had spent a “considerable”, confidential, amount of funds on ongoing support for people in the area, and had also invested almost £100,000 towards a nearby 3G football pitch.

However, it costs money to use the pitch and players must have bespoke astroturf trainers, making it “financially inaccessible for Dinnington people”, Mr Smith says.