Miners’ Big Pay.

Hokitika Guardian, 10 December 1921, Page 2

Miners’ Big Pay.

OVER £2l A WEEK. SYDNEY, Nov. 30. Two miners employed at Aberdarc Central Colliery, in the Cessnock district, have established a record for the . amount of pay drawn for the fortnight’s work. Their last pay totalled ' £BO for the pair, which works out at £2l 10s a week each. Pairs of miners have frequently drawn £BO per fortnight in the district, ■ bill, this pair of miners is not regarded • as fast workers by their mates. Many of the miners, working shorter hours than the managers of the mines, with no worries or responsibilities, are making more than the high officials a«i paid. Some of the men have their own motor cars it' which they drive to and j from their work. Some even ply their | cars for hire out of working hours, iu j competition with the licensed drivers of : vehicles. A protest against this cutting competition was recently made by the taxi drivers in Cessnock without 1 result. . _

Though the work of the coal miner is attentions, the working day is not a long one. It is supposed to he for a pigioil ol eight hours from- bank to hank, hut official figures show that some nt the men have lifted £3O for not re than fifty hours actual labotfr. The big draws are not limited to the men who do the actual mining of the coal. Wheelers, usually young and unmarried. working on tonnage, take pay allotments that run up to £2 a . day. These young irresponsibles, with too uiHth money and no cares, are the cause of most of the stopapges of work in the pi,s. In the course of the present year there have lieen over 300 hold-ups in the northern collieries, some of them over matters of the most trifling concern to the whole body of workers.