Idris James Philips, 87 Mixed-race miner whose father was from St Lucia. Mined in Bedwas from 14 and worked in Nantgarw Colliery for 30 years as a miner’s deputy. ‘People called you black this and black that. So we had to fight. We were good fighters. In the village nobody bothered with us, like. They wouldn’t be our friends ... The racism didn’t bother us. We were coloured and we knew we were as good as those or maybe better. You know that’s the way you got to think when you are a coloured person. You still get it a bit, but not like it used to be’