BRITAIN'S COAL

Evening Post, Volume CX, Issue 109, 4 November 1925, Page 7

BRITAIN'S COAL

A PROBLEM OF TO-DAY

CHEAP PRODUCTION REQUIRED

NATIONALISATION OR CO-OPERA-TION.

To a considerable extent the revival of British industry, which has been in a state of comparative stagnation for five years, depends upon the re-establish-ment of the British coal industry on a sound footing of prosperity.. The price of coal affects the price of every article manufactured in the country. But coal is dear owing to the high coat of production; British manufactures are dear owing to the hight cost of production, in which is included the high price of coal. It is because manufactures are dear that Britain's export trade is stagnant, and the country has to support a vast army of unemployed numbering 1,200,000. The British coal industry gives employment in normal times to over a million men, the value of the coal produced exceeding £230,000,000. The coal export trade in normal times reaches £100,000,000. But the coal trade of Great Britain is in a bad way, declares the Melbourne "A^e." Before the Government came to the assistance of the industry in August last many of the pits had been "closed, and many others were on the point of closing, because they could not be worked at a profit. The efforts of the coal owners to compel the miners to accept a reduction in wages or, alternatively, to work eight-hour shifts instead of seven, for the same wages^ precipitated a crisis, which the Government has temporarily shelved at the expense of the taxpayer. The Government, in order .to save the country from the ruinous effects of a disastrous coal strike or lock-out, induced Parliament to vote a.sum of £10,000,000 as "a subvention in aid of wages in the mining industry." By this means Parliament has guaranteed for a period of nine months the continuance of the national minimum wage which has prevailed in the coal industry for several years. But the miners contend thai tne bill is really a subvention of profits in the mining industry, for it virtually guarantees some degree of profit to owners whose pits are now being worked at a loss. The subsidy is to be employed in the following way. The'gross proceeds of the coal mines in each, distriot will be grouped, and the cost of production other than wages will be deducted from the total. The amount left over is the divisible balance, of which 13 per cent, is to be set aside as the profits of the,coal owners, the remaining 87 per cent, being the wages fund. If the sum represented by this 87 per cent, is more than $he wages bill of the district on the basis of the national minimum wage, there will be no subsidy required; but if it is less a subsidy will be given to the full extent of the deficiency. It is admitted that the Government's estimate of £10,000,000 as the total amount of the subsidy required to maintain wages at the national rate for nine months is only provisional, and that the ■amtiun,t may be greatly exceeded. Other estimates of the cost of the subsidy range from £15,000,000 io £40,----000. / SUBSIDY NOT A' SOLUTION.

The subsidy will do nothing to solve Britain's coal problem. . All it does is to give time in which efforts will be made to find the solution. The Government, has appointed a commission of inquiry to investigate the problem, arid, although, as has been admitted by Mr. Baldwin (the Prime Minister), no industry has been the subject of more frequent.'and futile inquiry than the British coal trade, so much is now at stake as regards the future, not only of the coal trade, but of British industries as a whole, that it is imperative to find a solution without further delay. For years past the foundations of the British coal, industry, have been steadily undermined. Britain was the first country to develop its coal resources at the dawn of the industrial, era in the middle of the nine-' teenth.century. She possessed magnificent coal seams, lying at no great depth, and these coal seams lay close to the seuboard within easy reach of excellent harbours. Witt these great advantages Britain built up a prosperous coal trade, which not only enabled her to export hundreds of millions of pounds' worth of raw coal, but also helped materially in making her for more than a generation the greatest manufacturing . country in the world. But coal is a wasting asset, and the successive generations of coal owners in Great Britain, have been actuated by the desire to get aa much as-possible out of the industry without, making provision for the future. The coal companies, instead of writing off their capital out of profits and building up reserves for development work, watered their capital and paid big dividends. The cost of production increased as the big seams near the surface gave out, and coal had to be obtained at'a greater depth, and the seams followed for long distances. In - Yorkshire there are new pits working on seams that lie near the surface. In these pits the coal is cut by machinery, carried by mechanical conveyors, and little expense is incurred in propping the roofs. But in some of the collieries in South Wales the coal lies more than two miles from the mouth of the pit, and, every yard of the roof has to be propped with timber. In these pits it is impossible to use modern coal-cutting machinery without endangering the safety of the miners. The disadvantage under which coal is being rained in Great Britain.are indicated by the fact that the cost of production is 19s per ton, compared with 12s 8d in the- United States. Tn the latter country, where coal-cutting machinery is extensively used, the output per man per shift is 3.82 tons, compared with 0.92 tons in Great Britain.