The Story of the Durham Miners (1662-1921). By Sidney Webb.
(Labour Publishing Co. 5s )—Mr. Webb relates clearly, if not impartially, the history of trade unionism in the Durham coalfield down to the present day. He does not omit to mention the grotesque failure of the " Co-operative Mining Company," which in 1874-5 bought the Mongwood Colliery near Chester- field and which cost the Durham miners about £15,500. The author's Bolshevik friends will be distressed to find that ho rightly attributes the great progress in civilization made by the Durham miners during the past century not merely, to trade unionism but also to the revival of religion ; we should add that the general humanitarian movement has benefited Durham as well as other parts of the British Isles. Mr. Webb complains of the housing conditions in the mining villages, where the coal owners provide free cottages ; but if the miners wanted better housing, they could easily obtain it either through the district
councils which they elect, or by paying fair rents to local builders, as miners do in Lancashire and Yorkshire. Mr. Webb draws a pleasant picture of the ideal mining village that might be established by the local council and the co-operative society, and he suggests that if the coal trade became a " public service," every miner would show " that sense of duty in the fulfilment of one's function in the service of the community which dis- tinguishes the conscious Co-operator from the Wage-Slave." Unhappily in the past few years, while the coal trade was under State control and therefore a " public service," we have not noticed that the miners showed any regard for the community, so that Mr. Webb's suggestion is at best but a pious hope.
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