I HAD thought the government’s attacks on miners and mining were a thing of the past. Obviously not. Big Pit at Blaenavon is clearly the latest target on the parliamentary dart board. How unsurprising that the projected axe will cut so deep into museum workers while leaving senior management miraculously unscathed. Sound familiar?

Free entry to museums throughout Wales has been a source of pride for years, so what noxious agency is worming its way to sabotage this? What staggers me is the suggestion that underground tours at Big Pit could conceivably be considered to be an “extra” and therefore subject to a fee. Let’s talk sense here – who would visit a mining museum without wanting to discover what went on underground? I mean, don’t the words ‘Big Pit’ say it all?

I hear the ching ching of bureaucratic tills and wonder who gets the money. Are we looking at the thin end of the wedge here? Will there soon be an entrance fee for every building in St Fagan’s? Will Newport’s Transporter Bridge only take credit cards? Will the Brecon Beacons be charged progressively from hillock to hillock? It takes only the slightest push to set the capitalist ball rolling. Ching ching!

Julian R Powell, Larch Grove, Malpas, Newport