The Coal Board Changes
The announcement of the names of the members of the new National Coal Board, which enters on its duties on August 1st, synchronises with disturbing predictions by the Minister of Fuel of another fuel crisis next winter unless production can still be substantially improved. Consumption is increasing at the rate of 8,000,000 tons over last year, and production by only 5,000,000 tons. Manpower is decreasing, and the introduction of foreign workers on a larger scale than has so far been con- templated may be necessary. It is in these circumstances that the new Coal Board takes over. The old Board suffered seriously through the loss of its vice-chairman, Sir Arthur Street, by death, and two members with wide experience of mine-direction, Sir Charles Reid and Sir Eric Young, by resignation. Now the chair- man, Lord Hyndley, who has served the Board well, and longer than he had intended, goes. Sir Hubert Houldsworth, a former Controller of the efficient South and West Yorkshire region, takes his place—an appointment that has been well received by the miners' union, as has that of Sir Andrew Bryan, Chief Inspector of Mines. Mr. Ebby Edwards, the trade union member, of the Board, remains ; so do most of its other members. The real question is of the principles on which the Board will work. Critics as experienced as those responsible for the recent Conservative pamphlet on the Structure and Control of the Coal Industry have urged the necessity for far more decentralisation, the Coal Board itself being confined to large questions of policy. Though no announcement has been made on that point, the composition of the new Board rather sug- gests that functional control from the centre may be quietly abandoned, and the regions given a larger measure of autonomy. If so it will be a welcome departure. Coal was the first industry to be nationalised. It has by no means justified the nationalisa- tion principle yet. To argue, as the Labour Party. that things would have been worse under private ownership is to adventure in the realm of speculation.
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