THE PRINCIPAL FACTOR

Evening Post, Volume CXI, Issue 73, 26 March 1926, Page 7

THE PRINCIPAL FACTOR

WAGE REDUCTIONS,

(Australian-New Zealand Cable Assn.) LONDON, 25th March. Mr. Baldwin's plan and direct offer took both owners and miners by surprise, but neither side has disclosed its views on the matter. The owners and miners met separately this "morning and jointly in the afternodn. In the meantime the Commission's report is being studied by miners' lodges throughout the country, in view of a conference of delegates to be held shortly. There is a tendency on the coalfields to concentrate upon the proposed wage reductions, though these will not affect the lowest paid men, ignoring the fact.that the report embodies proposals for which the miners have been agitating for years. Mr. A. J. Cook (secretary of the British, Miners' Federation), in a speech last night, said that. the men I would starve before they would, accept any reductions. "We have already done our bit," he declared. The "Daily Herald" (Labour) says that any sacrifice would bring hundreds of thousands of families down to the starvation line. "It remains to be seen | whether a solution will be found in earmarking Mr. Baldwin's provisional offer as.temporary assistance for the relief of workers thus affected. On the other side thero are indications of opposition to the conferring of power on municipal authorities to trade in coal, to compulsory profit-sharing, and to State purchase royalties and other recommendations requiring legislative sanction. The newspapers and publicists generally are, silent, hoping that the parties concerned will reach an agreement which, if effected, would be the biggest trade settlementon record.