We've Got What It Takes

The future of postwar Britain lies in the hands of her miners, according to this film encouraging young lads to work in the coal industry

The future of postwar Britain lies in the hands of her miners, according to this film encouraging young lads to work in the coal industry. Implausibly, Noel Newsome, urbane in his mackintosh and trilby, plays 'the man in the street', wandering down a hillside and into the Scottish village of Tillicoultry. Newsome persuades disillusioned local lad Tom, that coal is the career for him, by means of explaining that in postwar Britain miners are "the fighter pilots of the second Battle of Britain".

Off-screen, Newsome was a former director of the BBC Overseas Service and held the post of Director of Public Relations at the National Coal Board when this film was made. He also encouraged the idea of the production of a ten-minute monthly newsreel-cum-cinemagazine, which became Mining Review, and ran for more than 400 issues.