BRITISH COAL CRISIS

Hokitika Guardian, 1 February 1926, Page 2

BRITISH COAL CRISIS

(Australia & N.Z. Cable Association. 1 EMPEROR COOK AT OXFORD. STUDENTS THROW STONES. LONDON, January 30. Undergraduates vainly attempted to rush the Corn Exchange at Oxford in wiheh Air Cook (the Miners’ Secretary) made a speech on the coal situation, the students threw stones on the roof and smashed the windows. They also exploded fireworks. They then sang the National Anthem.

Mr Cook, who was inside, said:— “ Our miners could sing better than that lot! I am trying to prevent a crisis. Wo don’t want the mines for the miners hut for tho whole nation. The Government say that they will form a strike-breaking organisation, hut bayonets cannot cut coal.” While there was a decoy taxi cab outside the door, which was surrounded by the undergraduates, Mr Cook loft by another exit. He then crossed a road, and passed through a private house, where the Chief Constable joined him at the hack door with another taxi cab, in which he proceeded to the station without, being molested. MR THOMAS ON MR COOK. LONDON, January 29. Mr J. 11. Thomas, 51. P.. in a pungent letter to the “Daily Herald” sevcrley criticises tho miners’ leader. Mr Thomas says: “Like a majority of the members of the movement, I have long ceased to treat Mr Cook seriously. I only regret that a greatorganisation like the Minors’ Federation should day by day have its case ruined by his childish outbursts. When Mr Cook presumes to advise other unions and to criticise the Railwaymen’s Conference, he should remeinlier that the great mass of trade unionists do not judge leaders by frothy orations, but by their deliverance of tho goods. T am quite content to allow a comparison of mv services to tho railwaymen with his to the miners.”

REPLY TO MR THOMAS. [Received this day at 8 a m.) LONDON, January 30. Air Cook replying to Air Thomas’s letter says: “ I cannot claim to be an after-dinner speaker like Air Thomas, at functions which he attends, nor a leader of fashion, blit I do claim to he a class-conscious fighter for tho workers, and shall accept instructiryis only from the class l represent. The chief ambition of Mr Thomas, apparently, is to he a leader of fashion at dinners given by the enemies of tho working classes—it isn’t mine, and, thank Heaven, T have made no speeches which would look well in tho comic papers. Air Thomas says I am uo longer taken seriously by the majority of the Labour movement, but I am afraid Afr Thomas is out of touch therewith. “ AH Thomas, along with the Dukes and other noble lords, has long wished we were in a warm place. T hope T shan’t go there.” The “ Sunday Express ” says Air J. TT. Thomas, commenting, on Cook’s letter, said: “ Afy letter gave my opinion of Air Cook’s qualities as a leader, but his- statements about mq don’t matter.”