COAL MIMERS' STRIKE.

Auckland Star, Volume LXIII, Issue 140, 15 June 1932, Page 3

COAL MIMERS' STRIKE.

OWNERS STATE POSITION

BLAME PLACED ON UNIONS. CONFERENCES NOT REFUSED. The statement made by the national executive of the New Zealand Labour party that there is apparently some conflict between the mine owners and Mr. T. O. Bishop, secretary of the Coal Mine Owners' Association, was denied yesterday by Colonel W. D. Ilolgatc, president of the association, in the course of a statement in which he reviewed the events .leading up to the coal miners' strike. He said the Coal Miners' Federation was endeavouring to convey the impression that the owners had refused a conference with the unions. Mr. Bishop in his reply to the Labour party had made it quite clear that tho men had not been refused a conference, but that .the contrary was the case.

Colonel Ilolgatc said a conference was requested by the Northern Miners' Unions, and immediately granted. He reviewed tho circumstances in which that conference was abortive. On the West Coast a conference was asked for and agreed to, but the miners ceased work, although in the meantime the old conditions were to continue.

Question at Issue. Colonel Holgato said lie had no doubt that the strike, although commencing at Hikurangi, was brought about by the representatives of the federation unions on tho question of the owners claiming the unrestricted right to engage, and dismiss men without reservation —a right granted to every other industry. •Since the strike became general, all that tho miners' representatives had done was to appeal to the Government to force a conference. They had not communicated with Mr. Bishop or the mine owners. The Minister of Mines had recommended the unions to resume work and then ask for a conference. That was sound advice.

The owners, said Colonel Ilolgatc, were lighting for their very existence. No industry could carry on when it was constantly losing money, which had been the case' with every company for over twelve months. Stop-work meetings and strikes brought about by shortening hands, and other trivial matters, made it impossible for the industry to be carried on successfully. The owners realised the necessity for employers to keep as many men on as possible, but there was a limit beyond which the owners could not go without eventually having to close down some of the mines.

"Without Consideration." "It is inconceivable to think in times liko these, when there arc so many unemployed in the country relying on work at the cxi>cnse of almost unbearable taxation, that the men who have regular employment should so readily go out on. strike without any consideration, not only of the big loss to the various industries, but also the inconvenience to which they put the general public," concluded Mr. Holgatc. "For years past the mine owners have been meeting the unions in conference and have always arrived at a workable agreement between both parties. The unions know perfectly well that there would be no difficulty in again coming to terms, with the exception of the one clause they object to, and which the coalmine owners iiro insistent upon—the unrestricted right, to employ and dismiss men at their discretion."