TOPICS OF THE DAY COAL IN DEMAND AND OUT OF
IT PEOPLE are too apt to talk as though the only ' obstacles in the way of a settlement in the coalfields 'were either the "stubbornness and unreasonableness of the miners," or the "greed and inefficiency of theowners "- according as the synipathies and opinions of the observers of the present crisis incline this Way or that. As a matter • of fact; .however, there are many other considerations which though usually ignored are yet essential elements of the problem. The most vital of these is the fact that raw coal is falling out of demand as the source of power and warmth. Every day there comes news of some new process which will enable oil or charcoal (as recently described in these. columns) to be used instead of coal, and so cause a decrease in the demand for what was once Britain's chief industrial asset. But the discovery that oil is cheaper and better than coal, not only for marine 'engines, but for the furnaces of locomotives—only last week the London, Midland and Scottish Railway proved its value—is not all. People are also finding-that oil will Cook as well and as cheaply as coal-gas, and will also provide warmth in hot-baths and radiators. Next Come various inventions for economy and efficiency in the use of raw coal, which must all deer-ease the demand for the products of mir mines in that form.
The strike greatly boomed these coal-Saving de ices It Was a lesson and advertisement Of how to get on with comfort on twerify Or thirty per cent: legs alai than was formerly judged essential. Above all, the strike ( made people realize in a hundred ways that the road is Often a better transporter' than the railway. The railway ' (in general) means the use 'of coal ; the road the Use of Oil. When the coal dispute ends, we are bound to start again on it diminished demand for coal, or at any rate of raw untreated coal, which is what the mine-owners and the miners alike want to see us employ.
If we have justly stated the facts, as we believe we have, ene of two things_ must happen. We must either find some way of increasing the demand for coal, or we must see a greatly diminished product from our mines. It is useless to hew and transport unwanted coal. This, however, means closing mines ; and closing mines means throwing miners out of work. Which are we to choo. se ?
A great many people ;;vill at once say that admitting this to be the dilemma, the only thing is to reduce the output of coal with all its pathetic and disturbing conk: quences, and so get on to a sound economic basis: That would do very well, if we could find other forms of work for the miners here; or if not here, overseas; or, finally, if we were heartless enough to say" We are sorry for you, but if it is necessary, in the general interest; for you to perish, perish 'you must." We all know very well that we cannot, and, thank God, shall not,- attempt to treat the miners on any_ such basis. If the superfluous mines have to close, we shall be obliged to carry on the backs of the community the superfluous miners: ' After, having transferred a certain :number of miners from the coal districts which have been wholly or partially put out of action to those mines where there is still a demand for workers, after having found entirely new work for a few thousand others, and after having helped. a certain proportion Of the disinherited miners to emigrate to some overseas country or dominion willing to receive them; there must stik -.to acquiescence _in the reduced use of coal,' be a, very large :and permanent addition to our: uneMplOyed. But 'since we are not going to trythe -hopeless expedient of fOrcinehese unemployed iato other industries at low wages, and rso throw apples of discord into every' branch of industry, ,his raising Of unemployment: by say at _least 25 per cent. will mean =whatever name we may give it—Governmeni help, local or central, or both, conceal it as We may._ This in .turn must mean a Government subsidy at the rate of some E30,000,000 a year. In other ,words, we are not . going to get rid of subsidization by saying subsidies are unholy things, and that they must be banished from Or lips and thoughts.
_Therefore we must try, the other horn of the dilemma: We must find ways far inmasing the demand for coal. We must do that unless we consent, to put it politely, to a direct and immediate diminution of our population, or else to greatly increased taxation in order to support our inflated unemployed.
"B you can't increase the demand . for coal by whistling ! " True ; but you can by calling in the aid of chemistry, is the Germans are actually. doing. See the very remarkable article's which have been appearing this week -in the Daily News, from a_ competent observer sent to report on what the Ruhr coal-owners are doing. By converting their coal into oil, they are obtaining a .synthetic oil (not to mention other residual products) which is as good as natural oil, and so must immensely increase the demand for the products of their mines. It will be said that this is all visionary nonsense, because it will cost more to produce oil out of coal than to get it from Persia or Ameiiea. We doubt it ; but what if it Were to cost rather more; So long as it increased the demand for coal here, where the population exists for whose welfare We are, as a community, responsible? The tax-payers and rate-payers will very likely have to pay in any case; but it is better to pay less money to keep people in work, than to pay more to keep them out of work.
We have, in fact, no alternative to some form of public assistance—though we all hope it will be temporary— except a diminution of population by means which, talk as we may,we shall never adopt It is not wages or hours that matter so much as an increased demand for coal. -
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