BRITISH COAL MINERS

Evening Star, Issue 19407, 16 November 1926, Page 5

BRITISH COAL MINERS

LEADERS ACCEPT DEFEAT ADVICE TO MEH Press Association—By Telegraph—Copyright LONDON, November 14. • Mr Joseph Hall, financial secretary of the Miners’ Asspcintion of Yorkshire, speaking at Birdwell, said that the struggle was over, and, though the terms were distasteful, they were the best the miners’ leaders could obtain. They were the worst that any industrial movement had ever had forced upon it, but the alternative was the complete break-up of the federation. Mr J. H. Thomas, M.P.. speaking at Blackpool, put the blame tor the strike squally on the masters, tiro minors, and the Government. Ho said that now there was a moral obligation on all sections to try to save something from the wreck. “ The first thing _to bo avoided,” ho said, “is gloating over the miners’ defeat. There is a big reiponsibility upon the employers in the listricts. The men must be allowed to go back to work feeling that there is a genuine desire to play cricket and* make the best of the circumstances. Nobody wins credit for the handling of the dispute. The Government, the owners, and the miners are equally hlameable. A country with a debt of £6,000,000,000, which is dependent for four days out of six upon foreigners for its food, cannot afford such conflicts,” Mr C. T. Cramp, the railwaymons’ industrial general secretary, spanking at Middlesbrough, _ advocated the establishment of an industrial parliament to deal .with trade disputes, which, he said, should bo free from party politics and ilass domination, every interest being represented. If a certain industry could not give a proper subsistence wage it should be reorganised. If this was impossible, it would be better for that business to bo closed down altogether. TRADE REVIVAL PREDICTED. LONDON, November 14. “Prepare for a great flood of trade when the coal muddle ends,” said Mr Gilbert Vyle, president of the Birmingham Chamber of Commerce. “We have been able to hold a good deal of our business by good-will and prestige, and the people abroad have believed in us; so I nope that all business which was in sight before the strike began will not be lost.”