INCREASED PRICE OF COAL.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XLVI, Issue 13970, 28 January 1909, Page 6

INCREASED PRICE OF COAL.

ACTION BY TAUPIRI COMPANY,

Thr directors of the Taiipiri Coal Company have decided to advance the price of their coal by a shilling per ton. This, it appears, has been necessitated by the labour legislation enacted last session, which has increased the cost of the output. The Hours of Underground Workers Act of 1903, for instance, provides that eight hours,' counting from the time the workman leaves the surface to descend into the mine until he returns to the open air, shall be deemed a day's work, and that no person shall be compelled to work underground for more than eight hours on any day without being paid overtime at the rale of time and a-lialf. The result is that the cost of working mines has been greatly increased. Then, again, there are the extra liabilities imposed under the new Workers' Compensation for Accidents Act

For the past six years the Taupiri Company has taken its own risk at an average cost of about £356 per annum, but. with the new conditions imposed the directors have felt it unsafe to continue this, and have therefore taken out a policy with the State Insurance Deportment, the 'cheque drawn to cover the company's risk amounting to £1400.

With these additional" burdens cast upon them the directors felt they had no option but to raise the price of coal by Is per ton all round, slack excepted, and the public will therefore be called upon to pay the extra amount after the Ist prox.