Communists and Miners
The annual nuisance of Communist Party applications for affilia- tion to the Labour Party having been scotched last year, new methods are being tried. Mr. Arthur Homer, speaking at a press conference at Margate on Sunday, managed to secure some publicity for a series of proposals on production. Mr. Homer spoke as a member of the Communist Party Executive, but since he is also national secretary of the National Union of Mine- workers, his remarks have some importance. He is sometimes repre- sented as an unusual, even a semi-responsible, Communist. His pro- posals are a refutation both of that description of him and of the contradiction in terms which it includes. Mr. Horner wants 50,000 more miners than are provided for in the Government's programme. He wants to increase the already stiff demands made in the Miners' Charter by exempting miners' wages from Income Tax, and increas- ing still further miners' privileges in the matter of rations and hous- ing. No doubt in an attempt to forestall the outcry from the less privileged trade unions, and from a public confronted with a dis- tortion of industrial planning which would quite certainly hasten a complete economic breakdown, Mr. Homer would issue ration books only to "persons willing, if physically capable, to perform useful work" (a usefully vague term); prohibit emigration and holi- days abroad (an idea whose origin is clear enough) ; and put Mr. Harry Pollitt in charge of production. Unfortunately all this cannot be dismissed as obvious nonsense. Mr. Horner is a Communist and he occupies a key position—as long as he holds it. At the moment he is being called over the coals by his union, and with good reason. It is not usual for miners to respond favourably either to flattery, bribery, exploitation or contempt, and the policy of the Communist Party, as expressed by Mr. Homer, contains all of these things.
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