'Coal Strike Part Of World Plan'

Northern Advocate, 14 July 1949, Page 5

'Coal Strike Part Of World Plan'

SYDNEY, Thu. (1.30 p.m.).—Addressing a mass meeting of unionists in Melbourne, the secretary of the Victorian branch of the Seamen’s Union (Mr W. Bird) said: “The coal strike is part of a world plan. “It is like a fire in which the wood is green and difficult to burn. “We must be patient and use all the tactics we know to make it a bright fire.

“Capitalism is tottering to i 1 “This will be' one of the la workers.” The New South Wales Railway Department has begun removing coal lying in trucks at coalfields sidings. The first coal to be moved was in two trains carrying about'7oo tons of coal suitable for powerhouses.

ts doom. tst, if not the last, fight of the

completely unsuccessful and the later contempt of Grant. Williams and King, who all received 12 months, was all the more serious.

The Daily Telegraph's Brisbane correspondent says that the Communists have removed files and from the head office of the Queensland Communist Party apparently expecting a police raid.

It was taken without counter-action by miners from the old Rothbury siding—the scene of rioting in December. 1029. when police bullets killed one miner and wounded several others.

The Railway Department had planned to ship coal to Sydney after its arrival at Newcastle, but action by the Seamen’s Union means that collier crews will not be available.

Sydney Not So Grim AUCKLAND, Thu. (P.A.)— Living conditions for tourists in Sydney are not as difficult as some people have led New Zealanders to believe, according to a letter from a New Zealand woman visiting Sydney. There were three electric lights in her hotel bedropm, a radio plug and hot and cold running vvater.

The coal will now be railed to Sydney if sea transport cannot be arranged.

Though the land transport* group of unions is solidly behind the Government. the state secretary of the Federated Enginedrivers and Firemen’s Association (Mr W. Lane) has stated that members of the association in powerhouses will refuse to work coal from Cessnock and Cullen Bullen.

There was enough hot water for baths twice a day, and a bus to the centre of the city passed the hotel every three minutes.

“I saw no inconvenience except the lamp-lit entrance, which looked a bit grim,” she writes. “No one here condemns the miners; all they think and speak about is Communists, whom they blame for the whole trouble.”

The acting general president of the Miners' Federation (Mr W. Parkinson) says that complete disregard by tire land transport group for the coal mining unions’ black ban on coal at grass and in trucks, is ’’deliberate strikebreaking action.” Tire Federated Enginedrivers and Firemen's Association has no hand in the transport of coal. FEVERISH ORGANISATION

Supplies of coal claimed by the Joint Coal Board from the railway dumps at northern depots is also being railed to Sydney. The New South Wales Premier (Mr McGirr) said that coal which had been cut by union labour would be moved by union labour.

He added that Government officers had been negotiating with Sydney agents for coal in Britain, Belgium and Japan. A large squad of police and detectives left Sydney today for special duty on the coalfields. .

Reports that the Commonwealth and State Government intended moving coal at grass in the Cessnock and Kurri areas have caused feverish organisation by Communist leaders there. DECLARED BLACK Coal immobilised In trucks on the South Maitland railway line because of floods, have been declared black by miners who say that the fact that this coal was produced by union labour before the strike and paid for at union rates, does not affect the issue.

The Sydney Morning Herald reporter at Cessnock says that though young miners are prepared to resist violently, the older ones, who are in the majority, feel that the strike is on a trump-ed-up case and that the real issues have been, obscured by the gaoling of miners’ officials.

He adds that the feeling is growing that the presentation of a suitable formula would settle the strike. CONTEMPT OF LAW

The sentence of John Hodge King, secretary of the Western District Miners’ Federation, will run concurrently with his previous sentence of one month’s imprisonment. Mr Justice Foster said that King’s offence was just as serious as those of Williams and Grant.

He had plainly indicated his contempt of the law and had placed himself in the same position as the leaders.

The earlier sentence of six months’ imprisonment, on L. J. McPhillips was