The conclusions of the Inquiry were as follows :-
1. That while it would bo ruinous to continue the present policy of drift, nationalization of the mines would almost inevitably lower wages and add to the price of coal. If it took the form of State Socialism, it would tend to destroy initiative and substitute bureaucratic timidity. If it took the form of Syndicalism, it would transform the industry into a single gigantic trust controlled by an oligarchy, with no check on efficiency. 2. That there should be complete unified control of the mineral resources of the kingdom and their development in the national interest.
The proposals are that the State should buy out the 4,000 royalty owners who to-day are the freeholders of the ground out of which the coal is taken. Their rights would be acquired by a small body of Royalty Com- missioners :- " It will be a duty of this body to grant leases for the working of them [that is, the mineral rights] to lessees capable of working them on conditions which will
(a) promote judicious amalgamations of older mines. By this means much waste, overlapping, and inefficiency will be avoided;
[and this is a proposal which particularly appeals to us] compel adequate housing and village arrangements, as a condition of granting leases to mine coal. it is a cardinal part of the proposals that the ugly and wasteful legacies of the past shall be swept away, that good houses should bo provided as each new mine comes into being, and that town planning, recreation grounds, tree planting and so on, should not be the exception but the rule."
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