THE HUNTLY DISASTER.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LVII, Issue 154, 5 December 1914, Page 4

THE HUNTLY DISASTER.

IS THE GOVERNMENT CULPABLE J SOME REVELATIONS. ' MADE BY MIR. T. M. WILFORD.

Mr. T. M. Wilford, in tho course of his address to the huge gathering of electors at the Theatre Royal last night, devoted considerable time to the Huntly disaster, and the claims of Mr. Massey to be relieved, with his party, of all responsibility in connection therewith. Mr. Wilford, it will be remembered, was one of the counsel engaged in the enquiry into the disaster, in the House and on the platform the Government has been charged with culpable negligence in connection with tho Huiltly disaster, tho Opposition contending that, had the Coal Mines Bill of 1912 been passed into law, and its provisions enforced, this appalling disaster would never have occurred. To this the Prime Minister replies that the Government might just as well be blamed for the White Island disaster.

Mr. Wilford, before • opening his attack on the Government of the. day, read from Hansard apportion of a speech delivered in the House by the iHon. James ,A"en, Minister of Finance, in which he said that if a departmental officer was to be attacked by a member of the Houpe, the head of the department was the man who must accept the responsibility. "The person to be blame'd," the Minister had said, "is the Minister, and not any officer of his." . With these words Mr. Wiljford opened his attack.

He had just ascertained, ho said, why the Government had never gone on with the Coal Mines Amendment Bill. He had received a letter, making a charge) and lie was prepared to give the names of the xnen who made the statement, for they were men who could prove what he was about to say. (Voices: "Bravo, Tommy!" and "Good luck to you!") Mr. Massey would be given his opportunity of denying these statements if ho could. He had learned a lot about the Huntly disaster, though when he entered the recent proceedings lie had known .very littlo about hordes, ventilator intakes, rigs, and explosive mixtures. When Mr. Massey turned to the people and said the members of the Opposition were charging the members" of the Government with murder or manslaughter he was wrong, for they were doing nothing of the kind. What they were charging the Premier and his party with was that, after a private meeting with mine-owners, who had never placed their views before, the Mines Committee of Parliament when the measure was before them, he had dropped the Bill at the solicitations of those mine-owners, and were guilty of i negligence, and were undoubtedly blameworthy. Mr. Wilford went on to state the facts. On 10th February, 1912, a jnan was burned in the Taupiri Extended mine by if. gas explosion. In March, 1912, a man named. Willcox wag similarly burned in the same mine. The burning of Willcox was reported to the Mines Department. In 1911, before the Massey Government camp in, a Royal Commission went through the country, with a -view of making recommendations to the Government for improving the conditions in the mines. That Commission brought down a report, and recommended-that a Bill be put on the Statute Book. The Bill was drafted and introduced by the Hon. Eraser in 1912, styled the Coal Mines Amendment Bill, No. 2. TJie Bill went before Parliament, and was read a first time automatically. The Bill was referred to the Mines Committee, whoso members are the experts of the House on Mining Bills, and it was reported from Committee on October 17th, 1912. Now, when a Mining Bill passed this Committee, the House took it that the measure was proper and necessary. The Bill was put down on the order paper for its second reading on-23rd October. Mr. J. C. Brown, of the West Coast Gold Mining Company, and Mr. Fletcher, of the Huntly mine, and another representative of a mining company, met. ; the Hon. Fraser in his private room, and asked him to postpone the Bill. They objected to it as being unfair! The Minister said their objections were not .valid, and the Bill should go on. That course he should have stuck to. ' But then the mine-owners' representatives interviewed the Premier, instead of going before the Mines Committee. What passed between them and Mr. Massey in that private interview he did not know, but the result of it was that the Bill dropped on the order paper to sixteenth place, then seventeenth, eighteenth, and nineteenth. Mr. Poland asked the Government what had become of it, and he was assured that it would lie dealt witlf presently; and the Bill jumpod up to ninth place on the order paper. Parliament closed in 1912, without the Bill having been reached, and in 1913 it was never introduced. Clause 7 in the Bill provided that no lamp/or light other than a closed safety lamp (Should be allowed to be used in any place in a mine where there was likely to be a quantity of inflammable gas that would make naked lights dangerous.

"The Government say tliey had no knowledge that there had been an explosion in the mines at Huntly in 1912. I say that the two burnings in February and March, 1912, were reported to the Department, and if the Government did not know of them, they should have known." As he had said, no Bill was introduced in 1913, and when the Opposition now asked why, the Premier replied that there was no time to pass it on account of the strike. That was the story Mr. llassey was telling from one end of the country to another, and the story he asked the people to believe." The strike in 1913 had not started until November, and Parliament sat in that year from June to November. If Mr. Massey could pass 60 or 70 other Bills, why could he not have put the Coal Mines Bill on the Statute Book? Mr. Wilford proceeded to tell the real reason why, producing a letter which he had recently received from a man whose word was undoubted, and who was prepared to come forward and substantiate every word of it.

"Lust year," said the letter, "the Mining Amendment Bill was printed, and it was to he passed. But towards the end of the 1913 session Mr. -W. F. Grace, superintendent of the Waihi Grand Junction mine, came to Wellington, and opposed the Bill strongly, with the result that it was not proceeded with in 1913, and met the same fate as in 1912. Shortly after this the writer 1 saw Mr. Grace, and tackled him with killing the Bill in 1913, and Mr. Grace replied, admitting that he would not tolerate or put up with such a measure. This statement was made in the presence of a. third party, whose name would be produced if the facts were denied. The writer of the letter concluded: "I am prepared to swear to this if you want me." ~ If, continued Mr. Wilford, the Premier was prepared to deny that this man came down and saw a number' of ■ the Ministers, lie would produce the two witnesses to prpve that the statement made was the real reason for the Bill not coming before Parliament. (Applause.) "

Mr; Massqy, had said the inspector hajl power to close' the mine,- but'it. was no#'

spector who had closed tho Shag Point mine, rendering the Government liable to a claim for damages, which they had to pay. Had this Coal Mines Bill beelJ on the Statute Book, the naked lights would not have been used; am} Martin and the 42 other men who walked in the jig on that morning iri September with naked lights would not have been. in one moment blown into eternity. The Bill would have prevented the' use of naked lights, and the disaster would ndt have, happened. The original Bill had contained a clause, making safety lamps imperative, and the Bill passed aub9e(juent to tliQ explosion contained! the very same clause, word for word, ' TT» quoted the report of the officer of the Mines Department, after the burning of Kelly in the Jluntly mine on July oth, 1914, that he feared a disaster, and that lie would not take the blame, but not until after this awful disaster had oe-*, curred dicl the Government pass into law the legislation which experts an,d the" ' Royal Commission had declared to tie' ' necessary. '