MINERS GO BACK

Evening Post, Volume CII, Issue 50, 27 August 1921, Page 14

MINERS GO BACK

TERMS OF THE SETTLEMENT

NEW PROFIT-SHARING BASIS

GRANT OF £10,000,000 SUBSIDY.

IFROJI OBIt »fIX COMtESPMMNT.)

LONDON, 6th July.

After a stoppage lasting eighty-eight days, the coal dispute has been settled. .Though the country hae demonstrated a marvellous ability to dispense with British coal, the loss which it has suffered is stupendous. The cost to the unfortunate taxpayers alone is more than that of the South African War, and the cost to the country, direct and indirect, ,is estimated at £500,000,000.

Mr. | Lloyd George,' . explaining the terms in the House, said that the main feature of the settlement was that it fixed a new system of remuneration of the wage-earners—a system'by which the workmen share with the employers the proceeds of the industry. They thus obtain, not merely a direct- interest in the profits, but a direct, individual incentive to effort. "No such scientific profitsharing has ever been known in the history of any country, and certainly not in this' country. lam very hopeful that the scheme may create new relations between Capital and , Labour, not merely in this industry, but in all industries. It is necessary in this industry above all. ,'I ■ beli&vo that if this scheme is worked in a spirit of goodwill, it will more than repay the nation for all the damage done. It will, I believe, open a new era of co-operation. The Government has agreed, at the request of both parties, to restore the £10,000,000 grant which had been withdrawn. The object of this grant was to ease the fall in wages until they reach the economic-level the industry can afford. The grant will be ' available during the ' temporary period,' which expires at the.end of September, and after that the permanent scheme comes into operation. This is really a far-reaching plan of profit-shar-ing, and it ensures that the men shall have a direct share in the prosperity of the industry." • THE TERMS. The' demand for a pool has been abandoned, and a profit-sharing schemie established in the industry The miners are guaranteed a standard wage 20 per cent.' abovo the pre-war rate for the whole period of the agreement. The agreement is to be effective until 30th September, 1922, and then subject to three months' notice. Wage reductions under the new agreement will be 2s in July, 2s 6d in August, and 3s in Sep-' tember. As a matter' of fact (says a Xabour correspondent) they are terms which the miners could have had two m6nths ago); and there will be many bitter regrets that they were not agreed on then. National pool and national wage scales have been dropped, but the introduction of! a definite relationship, of profits to wages is perhaps the most remarkable of all modern' industrial developments. It marks the beginning of a great partnership which will have a tremendous effect not only on the efficiency of the coal industry itself, but on industrial policy generally. It has never been tried on a big* scale. Official labour has always fought the principle becausel it meant the continuation of that boon to the platform orators, . the "capitalist system." Now it forms the basic principle of the settlement of the greatest and most stubborn industrial dispute. The members of the executive, having struggled valiantly, bargained hard, and having secured terms, which '' they knew to be the best they can ever hope for, have practically pledged .themselves to get the men back to work. on terms which the ballot vote overwhelmingly rejected. The dispute has cost the mine workers themselves no less than £60,000,000 in wages alone. .It will cost them more yet. Many pits will not be able to reopen for some days. Thousands of men will probably never be absorbed at all. British coal production will'be 140,000,----000 tons less this year than before the war, and such is the state of the industry that there will probably not be work for more than half of the 250,000 men employed in South Wales for many weary weeks. - Unemployment' has grown tragically as a result of the stoppage. Other unions have become bankrupt. The cost of the coal ' dispute to industry, commerce, and wage-earners could be reckoned in appalling hundreds of millions sterling. Recovery will be a slow and difficult process, but' the end has come, and recovery will be the speedier if everyone makes the best' of the that has been brought about. ' CHEAPER COAL A NECESSITY. ■ "It is too much to anticipate swift recovery. from such a terrible blow," says the Daily Mail. "But if both sideswill go to work with energy and goodwill to give us an,abundant supply of much cheaper coal, the prospects will brighten. The public has the right to expect this much in. return for ite grant of £10,000,000. The real test of the settlement will be the degree by which coal is cheapened. On that everything depends. If the old pit cost' of 39s a ton before the stoppage is to be maintained, there may be British coal in the market, but there will be little demand for it, and our trade will continue paralysed." In the new agreement .the men have secured some . concessions. They (have been able>to minimise the original severity oV the wage cuts in the temporary period; and to get a more favourable distribution of the proceeds of the industry in the permanent settlement. The permanent settlement is the biggest thing that has ever been done in the way of making wages and profits depend on each' other.; The men, to do them justice", have always recognised the merits of this scheme. Their only objection to it was that it was on a district basis. They wanted it. on a national basis. That was refused, because Jit reallymeant a continuance of. Government control, which was what the miners wanted. In the old days the miner's^wages depended on the price of Ooal, and it paid the miner to put up its price. Now it will pay Mm to bring down the cost of production, and the great virtue of the scheme is that it is equally valuable to the owner, the miner, and the consumer. The mea have not gained their original object—the national pool of profits. The terms now approved'could have been secured before the strike began if only they would have dropped the demand for a pool and consented to talk wages. The men in tho coalfields have suffered because of this political demand standing in the way of a reasonable wages, settlement. .LOGICAL END OF SOCIALISM. The Morning Post still maintains that the Government has been "blackmailed into paying £10,000,000 of the national money to a body of men who tried to starve the country into submission. The division of an industry into two warring elements of the employer on the one side and the workmen on the other is a false division. The division of the world upon class lines instead of national lines is also a false division. No country can thrive upon such lines. Tho logical end of the doctrines accepted by the leaders of our working classes is the destruction of Uie means by which these working classes live, and therefore the destrufl-

lion of. the working classes. The difference between the situation of Russia ■and of England is that tho doctrines which have . actually destroyed Russia— i.e., the doctrine's of Socialism—-ara not yet put in force in.England. But it is the avowed intention of the Labour Party to put them in force when they are returned to office, and in the measure that th.ey succeed in their intention, in that measure will the state of.England come to resemble the state of Russia.."'