FIGHTING PROFITEERS.

Waipa Post, Volume XXI, Issue 1301, 7 October 1922, Page 7

FIGHTING PROFITEERS.

HENRY FORD'S DECISION. Henry Ford, the millionaire motor car magnate of Detroit, in announcing that his plants would shortly be closed because of conditioas in the American coal industry, began a fight for what he believes is a great principle. He declares it is a fight against all profiteering in coal and he is of the opinion that he is in a better position perhaps to do so than anyone else. He feels that by taking up the fight he is doing every other manufacturer, as well as working men throughout the country, a real ser- ; vice. Mr Ford denied that there is a coal shortage. The investigations 01 his representatives have convinced him that coal brokers of America have an enormous supply of coal The Ford Motor Company, could obtain enough coal to cover a tract ten acres square if it would submit to being victimised by profiteers, it was stated.

For several weeks the Ford offices at Dearborn have been flooded with offers of coal with delivery guaranteed. It was declared that the prices asked ranged from 100 to 300 per cent above the normal cost. The Detroit manufacturer believes that if he yields to what he terms "the hold up" of the coal brokers every other manufacturer will follow suit, and that coal prices will reach an unprecedented figure. One source close to Mr Ford said the manufacturer had "at the back of his mind" a picture of working men being unable to buy enough coal to keep their families warm because of the prices that eventually would be asked, "unless this profiteering was nipped in its inception." The Ford Company recently has received a large number of offers on the part of coal operators to sell mines. None of these offers, have been seriously considered, because of the present transportation conditions. The offering of these mines meant but little, "as they can be purchased now for almost nothing, because of the large stocks of coal held by brokers. The manufacturers still believe linking of the 'Louisville and Nashville and the. Detroit, Toledo and Ironton railways, the latter his own property, would solve not only the Ford Company problems, but those o every other coal user in the Grea Lakes region

The colliery proprietors of the United States are feeling the competition of the South Wales mines as hundreds of thousands of tons of high class anthracite coal is hurriedly crossing the Atlantic from ' Cardiff, both for Canada and Eastern United States.

Mr J. Sanderson, of the Europe and Asia Trading Company, says this organisation has supplied most of the coal to the Far Eastern stations used as coaling depots, and, as these stations have been well stocked up, the company has a considerable surplus on hand. He has offered over 100,000 tons of coal as being ready for shipment from Cardiff to any port on the North American continent. He mentions that there are still many mines in Wales. which are idle, and there are thousands of miners in the principality who would be glad of the chance to get the work. Alluding to the coal boom in the United Kingdom, Mr Sanderson said: f'One million tons will have to be shipped to the United States within two weeks. It is practically certain that the United Kingdom will hold the coal monopoly of the world for some time to come. Germany is unablq to meet her coal delivery contracts under the reparations terms with France. And it is likely that orders will also come from the European Continent. There is no other direction the world can look to in the matter of coal supply than the United Kingdom."

On the West Coast of the United States there has been no rise in the price of house coal. Many thousands of tons have been arriving weekly from New South Wales and other point*.