COAL-MINING CONFERENCE

Greymouth Evening Star, 7 December 1945, Page 8

COAL-MINING CONFERENCE

•DELEGATES’ STATEMENTS LONDON, iDec. 5. Delegates to the International Labour Office Industrial Conference on coalmining were welcomed at the first meeting by the British Minister of Labour (Mr. Isaacs). The conference consists of representatives of Governments, employers and workers of twelve countries, comprising United Kingdom,' United States, Canada, Australia, South . Africa, Belgium, France, Czechoslovakia, India, Nethr erlands,' Turkey ancl Poland. There are also delegations from the governing body of the 1.L.0. consisting of Sir John Forbes Watson for the British employers, and Leon Jouhaux for France. Mr. Isaacs said we knew of no industry wherein there were more important and more difficult problems to be solved than coalmining. The chairman, Leon Troclet, Belgian Minister of Labour, in his opening speech said that without adequate coal supplies it was impossible to get world reconstruction going. An introductory report prepared by the 1.L.0. as a basis for discussion, said there was a manpower shortage in the mining industry in almost all producing countries. Demobilisation of the armed forces and reconversion of war industries offered the mining industry the best possible opportunity for recruiting an excellent labour force with training in modern methods. It was suggested the committee consider the possibilities of developing the best international recruiting campaign to build up a solid body of mechanics, technicians and construction workers for employment in mines. Such a campaign would have to offer the miners of to-day and tomorrow more than good wages. It would have to offer a respectable and satisfactory career. Mr. Rowland James (Australia) made a plea for definite action on the extraction of oil from coal. He said that coal in future would not be in such great demand as at present, resulting in a depression in the coalfields and unemployment among miners, if wider uses for coal were not found. Scientists had declared that oil wells might exhaust themselves in the next thirty to thirty-five years. Mr. James commenting on the Indian position, said that Indian miners received an average wage of about eight shillings weekly.. He said that real slavery seemed to exist among’ miners of India. He is concerned that human beings should be working under such conditions. •