ED MILIBAND threw his weight yesterday behind efforts to ensure worker-owned Hatfield colliery remains open for at least another year.

Mr Miliband raised the future of the pit in the Commons during energy questions.

It was the first question he’s asked in Parliament since standing down as Labour leader in the wake of the party’s general election defeat.

The one-time energy secretary said Hatfield was under “very serious pressures” due to the doubling of the carbon tax earlier this year.

The government agreed to give the struggling pit a short-term £8 million loan in January in order to organise a “managed closure” by summer 2016.

But further pressure was put on the pit when the carbon tax, designed to compel manufacturers to switch to green energy, was raised £9.54 per ton to £18.08 in April.

Mr Miliband asked Tory Energy Secretary Amber Rudd to “work urgently … to ensure that the mine can at least stay open until the summer of next year as originally planned.”

He added: “Fairness to workers in industries affected is an essential part of a just, low-carbon transition.”

Hatfield colliery, which is in Mr Miliband’s Doncaster North constituency, was bought by its 500 employees in 2013.

Their efforts have been undermined by the 40 million tons of low-cost coal exported to Britain from Russia and the US every year.

National Union of Mineworkers leader-turned-MP Ian Lavery put pressure on the minister to keep the pit open beyond next summer.

He asked: “If it’s right and just to subsidise by billions of pounds French multinational energy companies, is it not just and right to subsidise the British deep-mine coal industry saving British jobs?”

Dennis Skinner shouted: “Yes, 3,000 jobs.”

In answer to Mr Miliband, Ms Rudd confirmed the government would lend the colliery £20m needed to stay open until next year. But told Mr Lavery that “unabated coal cannot continue.

“It is extremely high-carbon using, it’s also very dangerous to human health and there’s a long legacy of coal which is not desirable,” she said.