PLAYING FOR A STRIKE

Western Star, 12 October 1926, Page 3

PLAYING FOR A STRIKE

If the debate in the British Parliament on. the coal deadlock did not advance the hopes of a settlement much, it did show, through the mouth of one participant, who is eexpected to pay its price and the -cost of a readjustment. Mr Vernon Hartshorn, representative of a Welsh mining constituencv, said if work were resumed immediately the abnormal demand tor coal would cause a rise in prices, and the 10 per cent, reduction m wages which the miners had proposed would enable the industry to tide over the period until the proposed tribunal had been set up to determine an agreement based on the report of the Coal Commission. That is to say, if the miners . contributed a quota toward meeting the cost of raising coal, the community could he made to pay the rest. It always does pay. Before the strike it paid through the Consolidated Fund, by way of subsidy. After the settlement according to the principal Parliamentary spokesman of the price charged, for coal. The Coal Commission condemning the subsidy, said: It is indefensible that the people engaged in other industries should he taxed in order to provide profits for the ©mp]overs or to maintain-the wages of the" workers in the particular industry affected—their own profits and their own wages being often no better and sometimes worse. Under subsidy mineowners are n°w obtaining in some districts profits per ton substantially higher than was usual in the industry before the war; and hewers are earning on an average 76s for a full week when, in nnsubsidised industries, shipwrights,. for example, are earning oos and engineering fitters 575.’ The profits under subsidy ranged from, roughly 9d to 2s 9d a ton. Mr Hartshorn said that with his plan profits would vary from -5d to 2s 6d a ton during the period of high prices. That is to say, the; community would he paying the subsidy over again in a more direct shape, while the parties ;to the coal dispute reached a settlement at their leisure. There is not much room lor doubt on whom falls the burden of trouble in the mining industry.