“Mining is a dirty word in the UK or has been for a long time.”
Historically, the UK has a strong mining and processing heritage, from tin and tungsten in Devon and Cornwall to copper and iron in Northern Ireland and Yorkshire.
For centuries, extraction underpinned regional economies and powered national growth. However, mining’s public image is shaped less by that legacy and more by a turbulent and politically charged recent history.
Nowhere is this shift clearer than in coal. At the UK coal industry’s peak in the 1920s, more than one million workers were in the sector. Entire towns were built around pits, creating a social structure similar to Western Australia’s gold towns.
That changed dramatically in the 1984 miners’ strike – a defining moment in modern British history. According to the University of Oxford, thousands of miners were arrested, fined, imprisoned, or fired, some never allowed to work again.
The defeat of the strike led to the closure of most coal mines, a general deindustrialisation of the economy.
In recent years, mining has again become central to the global economy, but the UK is still playing catch up. Jeff Townsend, founder of the UK Critical Minerals Association says the nation has been “late to the party”.
“Because the government back then of civil service have always been relatively cautious about engaging in the mining sector,” Townsend tells this news service.
“However, we’ve seen that change over the last three years, and particularly this last year – big changes, very proactive.”
That changing mood was on display towards the tailend of 2025, when the All-Party Parliamentary Group for critical minerals discussed how the UK can unlock the full potential of its critical minerals sector. The discussions were based on delivering jobs, skills, and economic growth.
Critical minerals matter
Critical minerals are integral to modern society. Lithium is necessary for electronics, rare earths is needed for permanent magnets that drive wind turbines and electric vehicles – essential to power the global net zero transition.
Despite the importance of critical minerals, the UK currently produces none of the 34 minerals listed as critical in the UK Critical Minerals Intelligence Centre’s 2024 Criticality Assessment.
Decades of transition towards a service-based economy have left the nation with little active mining, even as dependence on imported materials has grown.
That is beginning to change, as the UK Government says projects for lithium, tin, tungsten, nickel, copper, cobalt, rare earths, and zinc are at various planning and pilot stages, with some expected to reach production by 2030.
One of the projects includes Anglo American’s (LSE:AAL) Woodsmith Project in Yorkshire – which is a deep planned polyhalite mine.
At full production, Woodsmith is expected to make £1.5 billion ($3.01 billion) annual contribution to the UK’s gross domestic product and would make the UK the world’s fifth largest fertiliser producer.
Meanwhile, the Britannia Refined Metals is an example of how the sector can drive jobs and growth in counties such as Kent. In mid-October 2025, the refinery opened its £41 billion copper recycling plant, which has capacity to process up to 25,000 tonnes of copper bearing waste per year.
Vision 2035
As the UK gets planning, the urgency for these minerals is clear. By 2035, UK demand for copper is forecast to double, while lithium demand is expected to surge by 1,100%.
Against this backdrop, the nation’s government unveiled its Vision 2035: Critical Minerals Strategy in November 2025, setting out an ambition to turn supply vulnerability into an economic opportunity.
Under the plan, the UK aims to meet at least 10% of annual demand for critical minerals domestically by 2035, including producing 50,000 tonnes of lithium per year.
A further 20% of demand is expected to be through recycling, while no more than 60% of total supply should come from any single country.
Townsend explains to Mining.com.au that this strategy is threefold.
“It’s to build or deliver what we can domestically, and knowing that’s not going to be everything that we require, but at least is a good foothold on key strategic projects,” he says.
“Secondly, drive investment and structure through changing the environment of the sector for players – building on that midstream.
“Then number three, it’s how do we make sure that we transition to the future green economy, the less globalised economy, in a way that is responsible.”
Building capability
The UK currently has an extensive network of universities and academic centres of research on critical minerals. That academic strength is now being paired with industrial ambition.
In April 2025, Frazer-Nash Consultancy entered into partnership with the Critical Minerals Association and the Materials Processing Institute to deliver a report assessing the potential to grow the UK’s midstream processing and recycling capability.
The partnership marks a critical step if the UK is to capture more value from its resources rather than exporting it overseas.
Despite the momentum, the UK still trails many of its peers. Townsend points to a cautious investment culture as a key obstacle.
“The country is nearly broke, so you can’t go wasting money on projects that don’t work,” he says.
At the October 2025 parliamentary meeting, Winshear Gold (TSX-V:WINS) CEO Richard Williams argued that the National Wealth Fund should dedicate specific funds to early-stage exploration and urged updates to the UK’s outdated geological data to attract investors.
Williams also suggested that the British Geological Survey should reallocate funding to focus their work domestically instead of internationally.
Townsend says this change is already underway, as the National Wealth Fund has billions of pounds to spend on Chriswell and the North companies, while UK Export Finance Australia is shifting from a narrow focus on exports to backing overseas projects – provided their offtake supports UK supply chains.
“The new strategy is about building, it’s not so much the funding, it’s how the government builds the environment to make the UK regionally attractive,” Townsend says.
“There is one strategic project that we can’t talk about for about a year, but if we can land that in the UK, then that is a huge step forward. Let’s have this conversation next year – we’ll be talking about something different entirely.”
For decades, mining in the UK has been burdened by history. But as the global race for critical minerals accelerates, that narrative is beginning to shift.
Through its Vision 2035 strategy, growing investment in midstream processing, and a renewed focus on domestic capability, the UK is signalling that mining is no longer a dirty word – but rather, a strategic necessity.
Write to Aaliyah Rogan at Mining.com.au
Images: Critical Minerals Association & Unsplash
