WIDENING OF RIFT AMONG MINE WORKERS

Greymouth Evening Star, 15 October 1948, Page 6

WIDENING OF RIFT AMONG MINE WORKERS

[N.Z.P.A. SPECIAL CORRESPONDENT]

LONDON, October 13. A widening of the rift in the British National Union of Mine Workeis between the non-Communists and the Communists seems likely as a direct consequence of the strike 01 French coal miners. Serious differences of opinion have occured between Mr Will Lawther, president of the union, andMr Arthur Horner, its Communist secretary. The Communists in Britain are attempting to get the miner’s lodges to protest against the export of coal to France while the miners are on strike, and the South Wales executive of the Miners’ Union has passed a resolution in that sense, though it decided “not to send the resolution anywhere.” Ncn-Communistic Major At the same time the non-Com-munist majority of the union’s national executive is encouraging the miners to produce more coal so that exports can be increased to other countries, including France. Mr Horner is in Paris at the invitation of the French, miners to attend the congress of the Communist led Confederation General du Travail (known briefly as the C.G.T.). Lhe British Trade Union Congress had previously rejected the miners invitation to send a delegate. . Since Mr Horner arrived m Paris he has had a long-range exchange with Mr Lawther. The union president has stated: “The French miners wiU not get any aid from 11s for their strikes. We cannot see how in one breath we can ask our mines to produce more coal to send to France to help them out of their difficulties, and in the next breath say we will send money to the French strikers; In Paris, Mr Horner has replied. •‘There has been' no meeting of the executive or of any authoritative part of the union to entitle Mr Lawther, or anyone, to make a statement of policy in relation to the French miners strike. Mr Lawther’s views are purely personal, and have nd authority 01 weight as far as the British miners are concerned.” British Coal Production

These domestic differences of Miners’ Union leaders over the French strike are perhaps of more significance when seen against the general hackground of the situation in the British mines, where production seems unlikelv to reach the national target of 211 ”000,000 tons for this year. The position is regarded so seriously that the leaders of the industry will meet today to discuss ways and means of increasing the output. A joint production committee has been' formed, of which Mr Arthur fjorner is a member. It seems that he has decided to stay in Faris to address the C.G.T. instead of being present at the first important meeting of the committee. It is thought possible that the differences of opinion over the French strike may bring to a head the conflict between the non-Communists and the Communists which has been simmering in the Miners’ Union for some time.

Communist Secretary

Mr Horner’s dual role of union secretary and Communist has constantly been the subject of comment, for while the union is endeavouring to secure higher production, the Communists have declared war on higher industrial production, in addition to other Government measures designed for Britain’s economic and. military defence. Mr Horner recently said that he saw no contradiction between his allegiance to the Communists and his loyalty to the miners. He said that he would oppose the Government’s policy so far as he disagreed with it, through political channels, but he had no intention of using his political position for industrial sabotage. While he would not campaign against production he would do so against the Marshall Plan. It is being asked how the General Council of the Trades Union Congress can give consent to a civil service purge of minor officials suspected of association with Communists or Fascists, while suffering Communists of wider influence to remain in the trade union fold.

Mr Horner is reported to have told the congress of the French General Confederation of Labour that it was mainly through Russian aid that the British miners were able to hold out during the strikes of 1921 and 1926. The confederation’s journal reports him as saying: “It was thanks to the assistance received from miners' organisations in other countries that we were able to hold out. It was thanks above all to the help of Russia, which sent us over £1,000,000.”