The Coal Conference.

Press, Volume LVII, Issue 17122, 18 April 1921, Page 6

The Coal Conference.

The opening sittings of the coal'- conference in 'Wellington make it tolerably clear that tlie position as between the owners and the Miners' Federation has not changed. The Federation still demands shorter hours, a high minimum wage, the abolition of the contract system., and the other conditions which, as the owners demonstrated at a previous cpnference ; will result in a much, reduced output and higher prices, to tlie consumer. "Whatever the owners may think about it, and there is no reason to suppose that they, would not' take the average man's view, everybody would ,be vety glad if the Federation's demands could be conceded without injury to the owners' right to a fair . profit and the public's prospects of getting plenty of coal at a reasonable price. The onus of proof is upon the Federation, but, as at the previous conference, th e Federation delegates are dependent upofl bare assertions without a particle of evidence to . support them. The position, as the public gees it, is this:tifat the of pay is such' that with even a moderate degree of fidelity to. hip jjo£. the can earn wages far higher than those earned by any, class of skilled workmen,- that the men do ppfc apply themselves to earning these wages and producing the output tjsb ijs wj?Jl with*? l their compass, and that 4hey are nevertheless putting forward demands which, as is obvious to everyone, wijl mean .still higher wages for still less work, and, incidentally,. a smaller supply of c»al than ,ever. The MiWs' Federation njustkjiojv that' that is how the public sees the situation, and thai so'far frojn being pitiable ; the position of the miner is v economically enviable in the eyes of a vast majority Of the people who earn .their Jiving by any means whatever.. Indeed, there were goine indications at the opening , gifting pf the. conference that ''the Federation does know this, for its representatives spent a good .deal of time'in stressing the unpleasantness of the miner's occuipation. Everyone knows that the miner's work is disagreeable, but the only way to get rid of the unpleasantness: of'mining is to abandon the mining industry altogether. It wilT remain a 'dispgreeable industry, no matter in •what degree the output was reduced land wages were increased. The only effect of the alterations in wages and hours proposed by thf| Federation would be the creatiaa of a new linpleasantness—the unpleasantness of such coal prices as would sorely burden'the publio and do a gfeat deal of harm to the industries of the Dominion. Hie neal aim of the. Federation has been the ruin of private interest in -cpal-minirig, and of private ownership by either a State monopoly or a syndicated industry. Disagreeable and irri«tating as is the present arrangement; with tlie recurring unreasonable andunjust strikes and limitations of output, it is preferable to either a .State monopoly which would leave iis father worse off in allthese, respects than* we are now or the ownership of the industry by a trade-imion monopoly which would have the country completely j»t, its meroy. In Great Britain the coal-miner s can at least claim that in some cases they are likely to receive terribly low wages. In New Zealand the most striking fact of th? mining industry is.the exceedingly high rate. of fact which is all the more striking now that | the country is suffering from financial j stringency and economic depression. ' We have failed to read public sentiment if that sentiment at the present time is not, so far as the miners are concerned, fi mingling of astonishment and anger that the Miners' Federation should choose tlie present time for its demands: .