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Otago Daily Times, Issue 15954, 23 December 1913, Page 4

MINERS AND THE STEIKE. There is every indication, now that the strike on the waterfront lias collapsed, that the coal miners who hastily and, in some- cases, even gleefully "downed tools " in a sympathetic strike have repented of their folly and, in a chastened spirit, are anxious to resume work. It is not to bo disguised that the strike on the part of the miners was a disquieting circumstance, since it undoubtedly threatened the possibility that the public might ha/e to submit to short commons of coal. Excepting at Huntly, where the men, had their particular grievance, whatover the justification for it may have been, against the Taupiri Coal Company, the miners had

no cause for complaint that gave them any excuse for deserting their posts. Unfortunately, however, the coal mining districts on the West Coast have been hotbeds of revolutionary Socialism, in which the "Red" Federation exercised a considerable amount of influence, and the miners themselves seem to ■ have been obsessed with the idea that the effect of their stopping the supply of coal at its source would bo to bring the whole community to its knees and to cause its abject surrender to the organisation that stupidly attempted to tyrannise over it. In this, however, they were hugely mistaken. A temporary shortage of coals has been experienced in some parts of the dominion— by a charitable institution, it is to bo • regretted, amongst other consumers—but it is a matter of common knowledge that largo shipments from other countries are now on their way to New Zealand. It has in this way been made clear that the people of this country are not dependent upon tho mines of the West Coast or upon those of Australia, for that matter, for the supplies they require. The shipments that are due to arrive very shortly are, indeed, so heavy that, unless they should be diverted to some other destination, there is not likely for some time to coma to be a very great demand for local coal. These importations supply one of many illustrations of tho emptiness of the grandiloquent boastings of some of tho orators to' whom the miners have been accustomed to listen with mingled admiration and awe, for the strikers were assured that not in the British dominions alone but even in Japan the miner would refuse to hew coal that might be intended for shipment to New Zealand. By this time, however, the coalminers on the West Coast and in other colliery districts in these islands probably realise as fully as the waterside workers and the seamen do the extent to which they have been duped by the leaders of the Federation. And tho most significant circumstance in connection with the overtures they are making for a resumption of work is that they seem to be not only perfectly willing but even eager to return to their places as members of unions registered under the Arbitration Act and thus to comply with a condition which it is understood the mineowners have decided to lay down. It would really seem that the United Federation of Labour will, when the New Year has brought with it a general restoration of industry throughout tho dominion, command the support of no workers other than the shearers "who refused to strike when the suggestion was made to them that they should do so! Apparently, therefore, the Federation will very soon be in the position of consisting almost exclusively of officials squabbling amongst themselves as a result of the mess they have made of the strike. There should be no great deal of competition for election to the office of president, which Mr W. T. Young has now resigned.