Grey River Argus SATURDAY, August 25, 1928. BLACKBALL’S PROBLEM.

Grey River Argus, 25 August 1928, Page 4

Grey River Argus SATURDAY, August 25, 1928. BLACKBALL’S PROBLEM.

By reaffirming the decision to work the single shift at their mine, the Blackball Coap Company directorate has placed the local Miners’ Union in a very unenviable predicament. The three alternatives of which the company has allowed the Union its choice in meeting the difficulty, 'while they may in some degree facilitate a selection as between the men to stay and those to go, mean the negation of the two alternatives which the Union had proposed to the company. The object of these was to avert any dismissals, by sharing the available work among all of the men hitherto employed, and asking the Government ' to give the company orders suffici-

ent to retain two shifts. The reply of the company has been that, as far as they are concerned, it is a. question either of one shift or none at all. Whatever, therefore, may be thought of the wisdom or otherwise of the company’s judgment, the situation to be faced is that of making the best possible for one and all out of the single shift. It is doubtless impossible to convince a company it should adopt a course which it is convinced will mean a continued loss. The possibilities, therefore, to be explored are those of making the amount of employment available on the one shift the maximum, and, at the same time, of reducing the hardship of all concerned to the minimum. Thus the position of the miners’ dependents will naturally claim consideration, as well as that of those who will be deprived of their employment. The alternatives offered by the company to meet the problem are these: That men* with wives, families. or other dependents, be given preference; that a ballot be taken as to who shall be retained in employment; or that the mine shall be taken over, on the tribute system. Lt is not difficult, however, to narrow down these ’issues to two, because the organised miners generally have already signified their antipathy to the tribute system of working. The question thus is whether the determinant factor shall, be the consideration of relative hardship or a matter purely of chance. If it be resolved that hardship shall be as far as possible minimised, the ballot alternative would be rejected, because, other things being equal, those with dependents must naturally suffer the greater hardship if they are idled and are compelled not only to go elsewhere in search of work, but to provide either for a new home for their dependents, or for two homes at once. The coal miner’s record in every country goes to show that he can be relied on to see that women and children are given every consideration. But the miner can also be relied on to stand by his fellowworker, which is the explanation of the whole Union’s offer to share whatever work there is to be had, even if it meant the introduction of something akin to what in the Old Country is notorious as the part-time system. The company itself has decided against such a proposal as being impracticable, and probably no worker would contemplate such an expedient other than as one of the briefest possible duration. If there were any question of its being anything like a permanency, it would scarcely be entertained at all. In the present instance, there . is no convincing evidence, no likely prospect, that it would be’merely temporary, but the indications are that it would be of some considerable duration. It consequently would in that event be possibly wiser to seek some other means of helping the men who are losing their employment, because, as already remarked, no miner would care to see his comrades reduced to the necessity of working for the starvation rate of nine shillings per day, which would be all that the Blackball single miners would receive from the present Government should it deign to place them upon some relief work or other at the “back o’ beyond.” It is even questionable whether the miners as a class would not prefer to help themselves in tiding their fellows over the interval until they find something other than toil at the princely remuneration of nine shillings per fine day, and nothing at all per wet day. The situation is indeed a most regrettable one. It should bring home forcibly to the Government that the position of the worker in New Zealand is becoming worse every day, and that the resources of the State should be fully used to reetifv the serious condition _ of things which has been developing. There are public works on the West Coast in a half-completed state, whereon the capital spent is yet returning nothing, and when more than one hundred and seventy men are handed the sack together, it is just such an occasion when expediency unites with prudence in dictating the prosecution of those works with the large supply of labour suddenly needing employment. This dislocation of labour is one of the most serious that there has ever been

on the /VV est Coast, and it calls for immediate action by the State, hi the: meantime, the workers’ organisation. have -to face the nroblem, and solve it as best they can. and they will in this trial have the sympathy of the whole community.