The Thames Star. Resurrexi. THURSDAY, FEBRUARY 22, 1894. THE RECENT COAL STRIKE.

Thames Star, Volume XXV, Issue 4667, 22 February 1894, Page 2

The Thames Star. Resurrexi. THURSDAY, FEBRUARY 22, 1894. THE RECENT COAL STRIKE.

This London correspondent of the Melbourne Age, in • letter to th^JjWMl on the recent coal strike, says:-" About the Sschief wrought by the strike there^ can oufortunately, be nc. room for f^rence of opinion. The net decrease in the earning/ of the railway ™mPanie« dv"D« August, September, October and the first fortnight of November was m round namJiew 12,000,000 sterling .when coop»fe4

with the corresponding period of 1892, and this large sum will have to be deducted from the dividends which would under ordinary circumstances be paid next spring. The loss in wages alone is estimated at £5,000,000, and as the contributions of the charitable and of the trades unions have not amounted to a fifth of that amount it follows that the colliery population are worse off by £4,000,000 than they were six months ago. But this does not by any means represent the entire deficiency, for at least an equal sum must be set down as the loss of wages sustained by workers in trades which were obliged to suspend or I curtail operations owing to the high price of coal during the last four months. Some of the £8,000,000 may be accounted for by inferior and deficient food, inasmuch as the men had no money to buy better, but the greater proportion of the sum is represented by the expenditure of savings, and by an increase of the indebtedness of the working classes to the shopkeepers, and by them to merchants, manufacturers, and producers.