The Gisborne Standard AND COOK COUNTY GAZETTE Published every Tuesday, Thursday, and Saturday Morning. Thurday August 30, 1888. THE COAL MINING STRIKE.

Gisborne Standard and Cook County Gazette, Volume II, Issue 189, 30 August 1888, Page 2

The Gisborne Standard AND COOK COUNTY GAZETTE Published every Tuesday, Thursday, and Saturday Morning.

Thurday August 30, 1888. THE COAL MINING STRIKE.

Be just and fear not; Let all the ends thou aim’st at be thy country’s, Thy God's, and truth’s.

The news that the Newcastle coal miners have gone out on strike will be received with infinite regret, not only by those particularly interested, but also by the whole civilised world. It is anticipated that the strike will affect fully 10,000 people, trade will be paralysed, and the commerce of the colonies be more or less upset. The affair is the more to be deplored when it is remembered that with a little more tact and good feeling on both sides, the dreaded calamity might have been averted. Even up to the last moment it was hoped that the matter might be amicably arranged, but events have not fulfilled the hope. We have every sympathy with labor in its deadly struggle with capital. We are glad to see that colonial laborers are in no way behind their brothers in the old world in standing up for their rights, and that they can show their employers they (the men) are not to be trifled with. Strikes, we believe, are not so much to be judged by present consequences as the lessons which they teach employer and workman. But we are deeply conscious that in these contests laborers are the greatest sufferers. They may establish the principle, but it will be to a great extent at their own expense. The issues at stake are too complicated to enable the ordinary mind to fairly judge to which side the blame is to be attached, though we fear it is an attempt to take advantage of the men. However that may be, the result must be lamented on all sides, and both the masters and men will suffer much loss. So far as New Zealand is concerned the withdrawal of the ballot which the Seamen's Union had asked for will be a welcome fact, as well as giving the men further assistance in their struggle against capital. If this threatened strike were also to take place it would mean the laying up for a time of a number of the Union Steamship Company's boats, and creating great embarrassment all round. In any case the present strike will throw out a large number of hard toilers. When the seamen and lumpers, to say nothing ot the

hands in factories, and elsewhere, are added to these it will be even then very difficult to guage the real amount of distress the strike will cause. The price of coal must rise, and as it is a commodity of everv day use it is those that can least afford it th at will suffer most There are some who would look upon the matter in a selfish light and say the result must be beneficial to the New Zealand coal industry. Prices must rise in New Zealand too, so that we will feel the effect more or less, but beyond that, if the New Zealand coal trade could never increase without a strike, we sincerely hope that it may never get another opportunity of doing so at the expense of others’ distress. It is to be hoped that a speedy settlement of the matter will be arrived at and that the lock out may be terminated at the earliest possible moment.