BLACK OUTLOOK IN GERMANY.

Timaru Herald, Volume CXXV, Issue 18659, 30 August 1930, Page 17

BLACK OUTLOOK IN GERMANY.

Facing Critical Period. POLITICAL AND ECONOMIC DIFFICULTIES. United Press Association—By Electno Telegraph—Copyright (Received August 29, 7.0 p.m.) LONDON, August 28. The British United Press says:— Germany is on the eve of a most critical period, due to the uncertainty of the impending election results; also to the disquieting economic outlook, and the industrial, agricultural and commercial depression, which is assuming alarming proportions. Unemployed will total 4,000,00 by midwinter. Germany has to pay £80,00,000 in reparations in the coming year, and highly placed authorities are discussing whether it will be necessary to ask for a moratorium early in 1921. Cabinet to-day lopped £9,000,000 from the Budget. The economic crisis is rapidly getting worse. Industry after industry has been caught in the slump and are dismissing workers. Even the Municipal Traffic Company dismissed 1600 of its staff, rejecting the alternative of holiday shifts. Several potteries and steel works are closing down owing to bad trade. In the meantime a big dispute is brewing in the Ruhr mines. The employers are demanding a 10 per cent, reduction in wages, while the unions are seeking an increase of 6d a shift. Negotiations have broken down.

ACTUAL SITUATION. COAL AND STEEL INDUSTRIES. At the beginning of June the Berlin correspondent of the “Daily Telegraph” reported: The Rhenish-West-phalian heavy industry, the most important in Germany, fears that the prevailing trade depression will bring about a critical situation. The average daily amount of coal brought to the surface in the Ruhr district, it is pointed out, was only 367,000 tons in the first week of April, as against 436,000 tons in November last, and the average daily sales of the Rhenish-Westphalian Coal Syndicate, which were 285,000 tons in November, were reduced to a daily average of 203,000 tons in the month of March. What is of great importance, however, is, it is insisted, the fact that the average daily sales of coal in the contested area fell from 151,000 tons in November last to 102,000 tons in the first three weeks of March, which means that foreign—mainly English—competition there is becoming even more keen, and is driving out German coal.

The coal that is collected at the pitheads in the Ruhr district, which now amounts to about 6,000,000 tons, represents a dead capital of nearly £6,000,000. Every possible measure has been taken to obviate dismissals, and for weeks past every eighth worker has worked only five days each week, which means further unproductive outlay, as the costs of maintenance are not reduced. It has, however, been found absolutely necessary to dismiss 24,000 miners between the end of January and the beginning of the present month.