MINERS NOT “BLUFFING”

Greymouth Evening Star, 8 September 1938, Page 7

MINERS NOT “BLUFFING”

c STRIKE BEGINS TO-MORROW | 't ' __ AUSTRALIAN ANXIETY | [BY CABLi —PRKSS ASSN. —COPYRIGHT.] > SYDNEY, September 7. The miners’ decision to strike isj creating uneasiness in business shipping circles. The popular feelingv had been that the miners were r “bluffing,” but the situation has now.: taken a different complexion and allg industries using coal are much per-g turbed. Most gas companies haver from two to three months’ supplies oP coal. ,: A prominent coal-owner that the miners’ action had an intolerable position. They hadi been taking one day off a week for~ several weeks, reducing their outputs by 20 per cent. Their claim for a six-' hour day from bank to bank would in A reality.work out at a four-hour day,:: while if all their demand's were A granted, the additional cost a ton, hey said, would be 10/-. Mr J. Curtin, Leader of the Federal .' Opposition, is urging the Prime Min-,* ister to intervene and convene a conference of the parties “with a view to r avoiding grievous, ; ultimate loss/irre-. spective of whether the strike sue-4 ceeds or fails.” • V LATER. • The Miners’ Federation announced 4 that nothing short of a Federal inquiry 4 would ward off a Strike, beginning at;* the week-end. No good purposes would be served by a conference with; the colliery proprietors. -J Mr. J. C. McCann, Chairman of the; Northern Collieries’ Association, to- ' night, deprecated the suggestion of* Federal intervention, while the Arbi-: tration Courts are open to the men, whose present’ award does pot expire until August next year. The colliery" proprietors saw no reason why coal i miners should, under the threat of di-? rect action, be provided with a special.• tribunal. y.

STATES NOT UNANIMOUS c (Rec, Sept. 8, 1 p.m.) SYDNEY, Sept. 8( Mr. Lyons said that he could not adopt Mr. Curtin’s suggestion, that the - Federal Government should intervene. He appealed to the miners to settle the dispute by arbitration. There appears to be doubt about the position ‘of the miners in other / States. Although the Victorian branch of the Miners’ Federation is prepared for a long stoppage, its members have not yet been instructed that they must - begin a general strike on Friday. It is doubtful whether the Queens- .■ land miners will strike. If they do, it will not be until after Monday, when k. stop-work meetings will be held. The coal miners in Tasmania, de- :• spite their objection as individuals to a general strike, apparently are to be forced into a Commonwealth-wide strike. The men on the Tasmanian fields do not attempt to conceal their objection to a cessation of work.

EFFECT IN NEW ZEALAND. AUCKLAND, September 8. The opinion that should there be a general.strike of coal miners, in Australia, the trouble would not spread to New Zealand before the elections, was expressed by Colonel W. D. Holgate, former President of the NewZealand Coal Mine Owners’ Associa-tion,-and a director of the Taupiri Coal Mines.

He said the most serious effect in the Dominion would’ not be directly caused by the strike, but by the terms of settlement which followed. He did not anticipate any shortage of coal, nor rise in price, due to the cessation of production in Australia. New Zealand imported very little coal now. There had been a steady decrease as the local output increased, and the gas companies turned more to use of Westport coal for gas-making purposes. The latest return showed that the import of gas coal from Newcastle in 1937 was 116,499 tons. Although this was an increase of 5000 tons on the previous year, there had been a steady decline from 1925, when New Zealand used’ 572,573 tons of Australian coal. The tendency was for a continued decline. •

Provided the strike did not spread it would have little or no effect on the Dominion. Assurances had been given in response to inquiries by the unions in New Zealand that coal would not be exported to Australia.