The Miners' Federation on Friday, June 3rd, informed the Prime
Minister that the districts—that is, casual meetings of miners—had all rejected the Government terms for the settle. ment of the strike. The coal-owners on the same day put forward a new and more liberal offer, providing for a standard minimum wage and " a subsistence wage to low-paid day wage workers." They would forgo any claim to share in surplus profits where wages were being reduced. They were prepared to accept a National Wages Board, but they were " unalterably opposed " to the demands of the miners' leaders—not of the miners themselves—for a " national pool " and a national as distinot from a district settlement of wages. The coal-owners' offer, it was estimated, would mean, with the Government subsidy, a reduction of no more than 2s. fkl. a shift in the miners' wages for the first month and of 3s. a shift for the next three or four months. If the miners cared to work a little harder, they could of course earn as much as before.
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