BEER STRIKE

Wairarapa Times-Age, 26 December 1940, Page 3

BEER STRIKE

DECLARED BY AUSTRALIAN MINERS. CHRISTMAS OTHERWISE NORMAL. (By Telegraph—Press Association—Copyright) SYDNEY, December 24. In spite of ever-increasing prices, the war troubles and the prospect of substantial Budget taxes after the holidays, the Australian people went about their Christmas shopping as though everything was normal. Reports show that the shopping crowds in the big feities just as dense as ever were engaged in the last-minute rush of buying, while the post offices were beseiged and all forms of transport fully booked for holiday traffic. The only people enduring discomfort are in the coalfields, where beer strikes against the higher prices are in full blast. It is estimated that 12,000 miners in the southern fields will go without. Christmas beer as a result of an embargo by the union on the local hotels. Some miners sought to circumvent the embargo by employing taxicabs to take supplies to their homes, but the news leaked out and the union officials warned taximen that they would be declared black if they persisted in the “clandestine tactics.”