COAL AND INDUSTRY. Koso[naoATED.]
FROM the national point of view the most serious aspect of the miners' demand for shorter hours and inoreased wages is the effect which the necessary increase in the price of coal will have upon the industries of the country. We say " necessary increase " because we assume that the Government will not make the fatuous mistake of attempt. ing to shift on to the taxpayer the increased cost which properly belongs to the coal consumer. To do so would only be to evade the difficulty, for the greater part of the taxable income of the country is derived from industry in one form or another, and therefore industry will have to bear the burden of the increased coat whether it is imposed directly upon the consumer or indirectly through the Exchequer. The disadvantage of the second method is that it partly conceals essential facts, and thus deludes a large part of the population with the idea that the State has a bottomless purse from which all demands can be satisfied without any cost to anybody, except perhaps the hated capitalist. Assuming that the straightforward method of charging the increased cost to the consumer is adopted, the whole country will quickly see what the immediate effect must be upon our national industries. Take first our shipping trade, which from the Imperial point of view is the most important of all our industries. This great industry springs primarily out of our insular position, and the spirit of enterprise which the original Anglo-Saxon invaders of the island of Britain brought with them. But in modern times the development of our shipping industry has been very largely dependent upon our deposits of coal, and upon the possibility of extracting that coal at a low cost. Many of the countries with which we have an active commerce have no coal, and it is profitable to send to them coal, the one heavy commodity which our country produces, in ships which bring back almost equally heavy commodities in the shape of foodstuffs. If the price of coal is to be appreciably raised, this basis of a large part of our shipping industry will disappear. Already it is being calculated that the Americans, who can now obtain coal on the seaboard at a cheaper rate than we can, will be able to capture the whole of Great Britain's previous export coal trade to South America, and as a consequence we shall either have to break off our direct shipping communications with South America altogether, or else to send out ships in ballast to fetch food- stuffs, which will then be burdened with double freight.
That, however, is only the beginning of the trouble, Not only does coal in its crude form give us an enormous advantage as sea carriers, but in addition it has enabled us to build up a vast manufacturing industry which other- wise we could never have acquired. Practically all our manufactures in Great Britain and Ireland depend upon coal. Here and there a few mills may be driven by water- power, and here and there a little corn may be ground by wind-power. But probably at least 99 per cent. of our industrial development depends upon coal, and it is largely because coal has been cheap that we have been able to produce manufactured goods at a low rate, and thus to capture a large proportion of the world's markets. With the rise in the price of coal that relative advantage disappears. It will affect almost every one of our industries, though necessarily at a different rate according to the proportion of coal consumption in each. Some industries require very much more coal than others. For example, in the pottery trade the price of coal is an enormously important factor, and the Midland manufacturers evidently regard with the gravest alarm the results of the threatened increase in the price. That alarm is intensified by the knowledge that of late years American pottery manufacturers have been extending their works and improving their goods. Twenty years ago the superiority of pottery was so great that English manufacturers could snap their fingers even at an American tariff of 60 per cent. ad valorem. It is doubtful whether this relative superiority can be permanently maintained in view of Ameridan progress, and it is still more doubtful whether with the threatened enor- mous increase in the price of coal it will be economically possible for the Midlands of England to compote effectively with Americanpottery manufacturers. Very similar problems arise with almost every industry that is examined. Take, for example, the jute industry with its home in Dundee. This flourishing Scottish industry is carried on in keen competition with an extremely well-organized corresponding industry on the banks of the Hoogly in Calcutta. There are doubtless differences in the quality of the goods turned out, but finally the question of cost is a determining factor, and if the Dundee manufacturers are to be compelled to pay more for their coal they may fired themselves beaten by Calcutta. A similar consideration applies to the cotton, iron, and steel industries, Thus all the nation's industries arc threatened with a grave danger as a result of the miners' demands. Beyond this point, which is a matter of polities, there is a further point, which is a matter of science. How far is it possible to obviate the effects of an increase in the price of coal by a more economical use of that primary source of heat and power ? This is a point inferentially discussed in an article on " Coal Conservation " in the Edinburgh Review by Professor Cobb, of Leeds University. Professor Cobb approaches the whole problem from the scientific point of view. As the result of experiments undertaken by the University of Leeds, he has arrived at the definite conclusion that the most economical method of using coal is first of all to convert it into gas. He gives good reasons for discounting the popular faith in electricity. Un- doubtedly electricity is a very convenient agency for transmitting power, hence its popularity ; but if the electricity is generated by means of a steam-engine, even of the most modern type, only a small fraction of the total heat value of the coal can be secured. Professor Cobb puts the efficiency at 13 per cent. That is to say that the best available steam-engines for producing electricity waste 87 per cent.-of the heating value of the coal. On the other hand, if coal is carbonized in gasworks, " for every 100 heat unite in the original coal, after making allowance for the heat necessary to carbonize it, 70 units are still available in gas, coke, and tar, while useful chemicals are extracted at the same time." The larger portion of these 70 units can be effectively used either for heating, as with the gas- fire, or for generating power, as with a gas-engine. In either event greater economy is secured than can be attained with the direct consumption of coal. If account further be taken of the economic value of the by-products obtained in carbonizing coal, the advantage to the nation becomes enormous. Thus there can be little doubt that we could to a considerable extent counterbalance the increased cost of coal now threatened if we were to alter our main system of power production and of domestic heating and substitute everywhere gas for coal. Obviously, however, such a great change must take a considerable period and must cost a very large amount of capital. Meanwhile many of the industries of the country may be reduced to stagnation by the demands which the miners have put forward. At a time when it is of the utmost importance to regain as quickly as possible our overseas trade, we are threatened with the destruction of a considerable part of that trade by the arbitrary action of a particular group of workmen.
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