The first aim of the miners after the breakdown of
last Saturday was to persuade the Government, some- how or other and in spite of the Act, to apply force to the owners—to make them act on the suggestion of the National Board. We wonder whether the miners have reflected upon what that demand involves. If they want the recommendations of the National Board to have the force of law they cannot possibly contract-out of any compulsion which might be applied to themselves from the same source. They were really inviting the Government to institute what would amount to a system of compulsory arbitration—a system which has worked_ very poorly in Australia and has always been shunned for good reasons in this country by both employers and employed. It is particularly surprising that the miners should have asked for such a thing, as it was the element of compulsion in the Samuel Report of 1926 which prevented them from accepting Sir Herbert Samuel's solution. Had they accepted it the Coal Strike would have been ended quickly and there would have been no General Strike.
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