THE COAL STRIKES.

Taihape Daily Times, 27 March 1918, Page 6

THE COAL STRIKES.

The Government, after waiting ■very patiently for the miners' in the State coal mines to settle the troubles between themselves which have led to the cessation of work, has decided the law made and provided for such cases must be set in motion if the farce of one set of men attempting to compel another set to pay an illegal levy by throwing down their tools is continued The -strikers have no complaint against their wages or their conditions of employment, but in order, as they declare, to bring their refractory fellows to their way of thinking on a matter altogether outside these material questions, they are stopping the supply of coal to the community. The men are guilty of a breach of the award under which they have been working and also of the War Regulations, and Mr. Massey has intimated to them very plainly their methods can be no longer tolerated. THE WHEAT QUESTION. i Should the Canterbury farmers persist in their demand for a guarantee of 7s a bushel for next season’s wheat crop, they may find the Government making other arrangements to secure an adequate supply of breadstuffs. Wheat growing in the North Island this year has not proved a success and the North Island farmers cannot he expected to ally themselves with those of the South in asking for a higher guarantee. Even w-ere the price raised to 7s few of the new growers would repeat last year’s experience. The feeling is spreading, indeed, that Australia, with its enor-

mens production of grain would be a much more reliable source of supply than the new lands of the Dominion, and that the Commonwealth authorities would be glad enough to facilitate an arrangement by which it would get rid of a part of its surplus at a figure below the price now suggested by the Canterbury growers.