THE GREY RIVER ARGUS TUESDAY, July 28th., 1925. BRITISH INDUSTRIAL CRISIS.

Grey River Argus, 28 July 1925, Page 4

THE GREY RIVER ARGUS TUESDAY, July 28th., 1925. BRITISH INDUSTRIAL CRISIS.

< One of the biggest crises in her industrial history now faces the Old Country, where Saturday may see well ‘over a million miners idled, Gt ar count of the coal owr.ers’ attempt to f-irce down their wages further below the level of subsistence. Id* that event, the railway men will carry no coal, and four million workers in other industries stand ready to sustain the mi icrs in their fight for the right to , live. A few years ago there was a similar situation, but sucii a crisis, when it recurs, has always certain new features, and this time one is that, I while the working class is more solidI ly united than when “Black Friday’’ destroyed their unity, the general public regard the workers’ stand with far greater sympathy. The average wages i of the British miners , (per day worked) including overtime, Sunday allowances, and contractors’ profits, are:— Scotland 10/6; Northumberland, 9/5; Durham, 10/-; Somerset 8/5; Bristol, ■ 8/9; Forest of Dean, 8/10; Cumberland, 8/10; South Staffordshire, 8/7; I Lancashire and Cheshire, 10/-; South Wales .10/11; nnd North Wales, 9/4. ' Out of these, deductions have to be. made for explosives, lights, insurances, .hospital, doctors, etc. Earnings have not kept pace with the cost of living in going up. A very large percentage . of miners average week-

ly and the highest, paid men average ?3/2id (some of those i.i Derbyshire). The average days worked lia|e been about live weekly, and latterly 300,000 men have been unemployed .continuously. One tliifd of the million men working are pieceworkers, receiving a little more than the others, whose rates are given above, but three-quar-ters of a million men do not average above 9/- per day. Upon this low rate the employers wish to impose a cut. Hundreds of thousands of mine workers doing hard, dangerous work take home to their families at week-end wages varying from 25/- to 40/-. Five of these are killed e v ery r day in the mines, aid 850 are seriously injured daily- on the average. What are the alternatives? The men ask a minimum rate of 12/- per day. They ask that hours be not increased and that means be maintained to secure the minimum rate on all fields. The owners want to destroy the principle of the national agreement ensuring a minimum, and to return again to the suicidal local tribunals which mean the dividing of the miners, particularly in the matter of bargaining. There are a couple of hundred thousand miners, however, whose prospect is that of never at their industry in the country. It is doubtless in view of so large an unemployed margin, quite as much as from the desire to undercut cheap foreign coal in foreign markets, that those who draw dividends and royalties from coal want to reduce wages. They feel that hunger alone is going to win their battle for them. They have apparently counted without the workers in other great industries, such as the transporters, who realise quite clearly that the miner’s fate to-day will be their own to-morrow, and that if there is now a eut in some wages, it will soon be made general among manual toilers. The Government is on the rail. It says both sides have a good case. It is evident that the workers do not. want a strike. Things are bad enough without one. Their Alliance is partly meant to deter the owners from locking out the miners. It may fail in this, hut it may’ not fail in its other object, namely-, to fight tlie employers as soon as they do loek out the miners by the use of the workers’ only weapon, his labour power, in such a manner as will counter the direct action of the employer. It is to be hoped an eleventh hour solution is found. If not, it is to be hoped the workers win, and win quickly.