THE KENT COALFIELDS.
[To the Editor of the SPECTATOR.] SIR,—I read with interest the article in the Spectator of June 7th, entitled " A Civic Sense in England " by Mr. Adshead. Your writer is an idealist, and while the world has need of such men, I think that he has taken up the wrong subject for his theme. He has a vision that the county of Kent can preserve all its natural beauty, and that the minerals can also be exploited, provided that the Regional Planning Committee, coupled with Government control, is given full power of direction. To him Kent is a place where " every prospect pleases," and only coalowners and collieries are vile. I think that it must be admitted that collieries and their concomitant dirt-bings are not actual things of beauty and are perhaps inoffensive only to those who appreciate the wonderful progress that has been made in winning coal, by sinking through difficult strata to great depths by the most modem methods.
I am afraid that the poet, the artist and the coalowners are not " of imagination all compact." The first two see the beauty of things and delight in what suits their tem- perament, while on the other hand the coalowner is much more prosaic. In these utilitarian days when we must deal - with the question Of employment, a octalowner views a good going colliery as a very necessary' evil on the landscape, seeing it provides work for thousands of his fellOw men. But surely the attractiveness of a countryside must to-day yield something of its beauty in order that there may be drawn from it something which gives pulsation to the life Of this country.
Mr. Adshead refers to the " destruction of a county by a few individuals who 'have the means at their disposal of raising coal." May I point out that no coal company willingly destroys Kent nor any other county, but coal must be worked where it is found and debris must be brought to the surface when it cannot be stowed underground. Spoil dumps are the last thing a coalowner wants to see on the surface, as it would cost him much less to stow it below than it would do to wind it and throw it on the ground.
I can assure your writer that mines are sunk in positions which are economically the best, so far as mining engineering skill and prescience can direct, and are put down, as far as it is practicable, where they will do the least destruction to agriculture or affect residential positions ; but to suggest that there should be protective legislation to " determine definitely the positions where shafts may be sunk, spoil dumped, &c., &C.," and that a colliery company should " work a mine only in accordance with the requirements of such a plan " is absolutely absurd. To suggest that these matters should be the subject of national " guidance and control " is to suggest such a petty interference as would sterilize and negative all initiative and enterprise on the coalowners' part. I repeat that no coal company willingly destroys a countryside, and mineral fields are economically and scientifically worked, but if the beauty of a landscape must be preserved in preference to the needs of an industrial nation, then good-bye to this country's future.
Reference is made to the money that has been spent on the Kent coalfields. Perhaps some has been, as the writer says, " squandered," but • while private concerns persevere and overcome unlooked-for trials encountered in the progress of their work, I should like to point out that no Government servant would risk his reputation in recommending such a venture ; but this spending of money has, all the same been bringing to light certain facts which have solved the riddle of the Kent coalfield, and to-day companies are " rising on their dead selves to higher thirgs." Remembering the baiting that the coalowners underwent on the question of miners' houses during the Sankey Commission, there is not the slightest doubt that they would very willingly leave to a Regional Committee, or any other committee, the building of garden cities for their workmen, in order to preserve as far as it is possible the amenities of the countryside, but so long as coalowners are responsible for the efficient manage- ment of their own business, they cannot be trammelled in any way by such proposals as have been put forward by the writer of your article. The declension would be—civic sense—super-civic sense—nonsense.—I am, Sir, &c.,
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