The Control of Coal-Mining
There will be much sympathy with the Miners' Fede- ration in its contention that the coal industry has benefited by the strict regulation of output and sale which the Coal Mines Act of 1930 imposed. That part of the Act will cease to operate at the cud of this year unless it is renewed, but many coalowners will doubtless share the millers' belief that it is too valuable to be abandoned. There have been difficulties in applying the Act to so complicated an industry, but it is clear that the international regulation of the European coal trade, which must come about some day, is not to be attained unless our own trade can present a united front, as it does under the Act. But the Minere Federation will have less support for its proposal that domestic coal prices should be artificially raised so that the pits supplying the home consumer may contribute to a bounty on the coal which is exported. The miners may see some benefit for themselves in this suggestion, but from the national standpoint it would be suicidal to make our own coal dearer so that our foreign customers and manufacturing rivals might get their coal cheaper.
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