"JUMPING" AT COOGARDIE.

Evening Post, Volume XLVIII, Issue 48, 25 August 1894, Page 6 (Supplement)

"JUMPING" AT COOGARDIE.

• Jumping at Coolgardie is described by a mining expert as "a blessing to the bogus miner, syndicate, or company, and a curse to the legitimate miner, syndicate or company." By the exerciseof friendly jumping, there are scores of mines that have never been worked from the day they were pegged out, some of them more than 12 months ago. This is the modus operandi :— Four men go into partnership. The lease is taken up in one man's name ; say in the name of Brown. Within 30 days he has to put labour on. Pie fails to do it. His partner, 'Smith, lodges a complaint. The title being in dispute, no labour is wanted. The case is hung up for from some two or three months. Brown does not appear. Smith gets the lease. Smith is allowed a certain timo. Jones "jumps." Another three or four months expires, and Kobinson's turn comes round, and when the list of partners is exhausted, it is a mighty easy thing to find* a dummy. Nine out of ten "jumps-" in Coolgardie are of this character. On the other hand, under their law, which provides for " continuous work," mines cau be jumped by reason of one day's absence or neglect, whether accidental or deliberate. Under their admittedly defective law, a company is thus at the mercy of the manager, md that has engendered a great deal of blackmailing and many other villainies.