Central Administrative Records of the National Coal Board

Division within COAL

1898-1997

Central administrative records of the National Coal Board (NCB) relating to responsibilities of headquarter's departments.

Comprises general records:

• Minutes of NCB meetings, COAL 21.
• Annual reports and accounts, COAL 22.
• Profit and loss accounts, COAL 72.
• Memoranda of agreements, COAL 42.
• Minutes and papers of committees, COAL 74 and COAL 78.
• Signed and sealed agreements, COAL 99.
• Charts and tables of divisional organisation, COAL 5.
• Manuals and directories for the disposition of staff, COAL 3.
• Specifications leaflets, COAL 24.
• Coal and Coal News, NCB's internal newspaper, COAL 71.
• Standing instructions, COAL 25.
• Aberfan disaster, claims for compensation, COAL 102.
• Guides to the Collieries, COAL 103.
• Reports and publications, COAL 104.

Comprises records of the following departments:

• Audit Department, COAL 94.
• Central Planning Unit, COAL 96.
• Chairman's Office, COAL 31, correspondence and papers concerning the Aberfan disaster, COAL 73.
• Coal Products Division and predecessors, COAL 82.
• Estates Branch concerning the Board's land and housing interests, COAL 45.
• Finance Department, COAL 23.
• Industrial Relations Department and predecessors, COAL 26.
• International Department and successors, COAL 95.
• Legal Department, COAL 27.
• Marketing Department, COAL 28.
• Mining Department and Production Department, COAL 29.
• Opencast Executive and British Coal Opencast records, COAL 81.
• Operations Directorate and Operations Department, COAL 91.
• Organisation Planning Group, COAL 98.
• Public Relations Department, COAL 32.
• Purchasing and Stores Department and Supply and Contracts Departments, COAL 79.
• Secretary's Department, COAL 30, colliery files, COAL 89.
• Staff Department and its predecessors, COAL 33.
• Statistics Department, COAL 44.
• Tredomen Engineering Ltd., COAL 86.

Public Record(s)

English

• British Coal Corporation, Chairmans Office, 1987-1997
• British Coal Corporation, Secretarys Department, 1987-1997
• National Coal Board, Chairmans Office, 1947-1987
• National Coal Board, Secretarys Department, 1947-1987

37 series

Topics

Labour

Trade and commerce

Maps and plans

Legal

Coal

Disasters and emergencies

Mining and quarrying

Operations, battles and campaigns

The Secretary's Department was created in 1946 prior to the nationalisation of the coal industry in January 1947. Its functions were to co-ordinate the business of the Board and its sub-committees; to ensure that there was no overlap between departments; to render common services for all departments (staffing and organisation, accommodation, statistics, and public relations) and to undertake functions which did not fit into the remit of other NCB departments. It was headed by the Secretary to the Board, a deputy secretary and an assistant secretary.

The Chairman's Office dealt with the correspondence of the Chairman and Deputy Chairman of the NCB; this was concerned very largely with policy and organisation. In the early years after nationalisation the Secretary's Department carried out a wide range of functions besides the provision of a Central Secretariat and an Establishments Branch. Thus, its Registrar's Branch dealt with the registration of assets, patents, licences and estate management, and the Establishments Branch with miners' pensions, superannuation, and some welfare functions. The Central Secretariat dealt with statistics, co-ordination, consultative machinery and public relations.

In the late 1950s the board's headquarters organisation was radically overhauled: the Secretary's department was organised into five branches: General Services, Records, Library and Information Branch, Patents Branch and the Central Secretariat. In addition a separate Staff Department was established and other functions of the Secretary's Department were devolved to existing or new departments. Establishment responsibilities transferred to a new Establishment Department in 1954.

Following the Fleck Report and the resulting reorganisation, functions of the Establishments (Finance) Branch such as pensions, common law claims, insurance and travelling and subsistence were split between the Finance Department and the Staff and Industrial Relations Department. Statistics became a separate department in 1959. The property sub-section went to the Estates Department in 1963, which superseded the now virtually defunct Registrar's Branch, and in 1962 an independent branch within the Secretary's Department was set up to deal with patents, leaving the Secretary's Branch to deal with internal functions only. Public Relations became an independent department in 1967 and in the early 1970s economic planning functions were placed in the Secretary's Department for two years, before being transferred to the Central Planning Unit.

Following the reorganisation of the National Coal Board in 1967 the principal purpose of the Secretary's Department was to assist line management in co-ordinating the work of departments and other bodies such as the Opencast Executive, and to ensure that appropriate action is taken to carry Board decisions into effect.

There were also small units headed by regional secretaries and area secretaries at regional and area offices.