NOT SHARED

Wairarapa Times-Age, 7 October 1943, Page 4

NOT SHARED

BY OPPOSITION CRITICS FEDERAL PREMIER’S FAITH IN ADEQUATE PRODUCTION OF COAL. “AUSTRALIA BEING LET DOWN.” (By Telegraph—Press Association—Copyright) (Received This Day, 11.50 p.m.) CANBERRA, This Day. His faith that Australia’s coal miners will produce the coal urgently needed has been expressed by the Federal Prime Minister (Mr Curtin), who has agreed to the miners having a nine days’ holiday over the Christmas and New Year period. Mr Curtin, however, admitted to the House of Representatives that, because of increased stoppages, Australian coal production in the last three months was less than in the corresponding period of 1942. An Opposition member claimed that more than 100 stoppages in New South Wales mines during a recent five-week period had resulted in the loss of about 100,000 tons of coal. Mr Curtin answered by pointing out that the present Australian coal production was a record. Earlier Mr Curtin had told coal miners’ representatives that he would have taken skilled men from the army and put them into the mines long ago if he had been able to find enough skilled men. He said workers who caused unnecessary stoppages were scabbing on their mates. The miners will submit a number of suggestions for increasing their output to a Cabinet sub-committee appointed to investigate the Commonwealth’s coal position The “Sydney Morning Herald” today refers editorially to the coal situation as “intolerable,” and says that a serious coal famine is looming daily closer. The paper says the outcome of Mr Curtin’s Conference with the miners is “disappointing,” and adds: “Australia is being let down every day by men who appear to be convinced that they are above the law, and can defy it with impunity.”