THE COAL TROUBLE

Dominion, Volume 13, Issue 44, 15 November 1919, Page 8

THE COAL TROUBLE

Sir.—lt is apparent that the coal crisis is not vet past. The recent action of the Wellington wharf labourers as well 36 that of the labourers in Auckland in refusing to unload sugar indicates that tho Labour agitators who;' control the coal mine unions and the wharf labourers' uni'ons are only awaiting a favourable ODDOi'tunity, probably after the election. to precipitate a Dominion-wido crisis on an unprecedented scale. Tho remit formation of the Alliance of Labour. an organisation framed and eonsti'uted on approved' I.W.W. lines, as can be demonstrated by refereneo to s ~- Kaufman-i's book "The One Big Union," is an instrument prepared to precipitate a national strike with the miners' demand 'as the movocative cause. I have had the oiiDortunity lecently of gleaning information first-hand from the miners themselves concerning the situation so far as the individual miners are concerned. I iifivo been convinced that there are some matters relating to rates of nav and condiiio'is of labour which ought to be ao'insted, but lam also convinced that ali adiustuieirts could be made and .thfi bulk of the miners satisfied were it not that the organisations have been seized, and are now controlled by extremists. whose object is not to find a settlement, but to forward their Bolshevik. 'evolutionary, and I.W.W. programme tor a complete revolution in this countrv. Let this one illustration suffice. Th« printed demands of the Coal Miners' Federation insist that amongst the holidavs '•o be recognised and paid for shall be May Day, Labour Day. "and St. Patrick's Day, whilst the King's Birthdav shall be disregarded and another dav substitii ted in lieu thereof. I pointed out to meetings in which miners were iargeiv represented or constituted the whole audience,. that these deniands alienated the sympathy of nil Protestant natriotic citizens, evidencing, as they do, that the oemands express not the legitimate claims of Labour, but the dislovalh- ol revolutionary traitors, such as I.W.W.'s and Sinn Fciners. I was assured both in meetings, and by n number of miners personally,, that those de* manrls were never submitted to the mi:i« era themselves for approval, but hava heer, inserted by their leaders, the maioritv of whom aro violently anti-British, Red Federation agitators, and Irish disloyalists. Tho only union to which, so far as I could learn, the oemand had l»een {submitted, was the Rununga Union, the most extreme and revolutionary of them all. . The housing conditions, especially at Burnett's K»icp, constitute n swindnl fnr greater than exists in any slum are.i in anv city in the Dominion. 1 hat women and children should be forced to liveunder the conditions whicn eouio of them endure a fiords giounds to justify tho grave ofcsatiefa/.'tion and social unrest that marks so many of the coal centres. The Government must insist that the bousing conditions be remedied, and that these'men with their wives nnd families 'who live in isolated places far removed from the conveniences of towns, not to mention eitv life, and who endure danger and perforin strenuous work, snail at least have house accommodation fit far educated ami intelligent men and women to live in and to rear their children with some degree of comfort and refinement. There is an idea current that the miners as a whole are extremists in uolitics and disloyal. Nothing could be mor<- uplruc. Lirge numbers of tho miners aro members of organisations niedged tf, honour the. King and maintain the Empire. They aro patriotic and ioval. ami their demands reasonable, if expressed by themselves, and without tho interference of professional agitators, manv of whom have neither creed nor country, honour nor responsibility, but whose onlv consern, is to promote increasing agitation and unrest, in the hone that out of the chaos they may climb to power and affluence. Iho cablegrams have reported die round-up of certain disloyalists who in the United States have sougnt to undo the Constitution and overthrow' the Government; these the United .States Government is deporting. The deportation of twenty men from tho coal mining centres of New /.calami would be Hie surest way to secure ueace and harmony in the coal mines, and jet ui-der our easy British loierniion some oi' these men seek admission lo the halls of Legislature that they mav carry out i.iore swiftly their nefarious designs-—I am, etc., HOWARD ELLIOTS. ■ Wellington, November 13,