18

THE COLLIERY GUARDIAN.

July 2, 1915.

obvious that almost any diameter of sheave, however
small, would be an immense improvement on the pulley
edge which is now continually scraping away the rope
and itself.

To sum up this part of the case : the light, plain,
ungrooved tapered drum.herein suggested assures even
coiling throughout the wind, and abolishes the angle of
friction, although it increases the angle of obliquity.
The friction vanishes, simply because the contact of
coil against coil on the one hand, and the angle of
obliquity on the other hand, are always on opposite
sides of the radius vector. The rope continually falls
into its proper place, not by doing work, but by shirk-
ing it. It assumes its desired position simply because
that position coincides with the lowest point which the
rope can occupy in the line of pressure. Hence, it
gravitates automatically and certainly into its desired
position, for precisely the same reason that water, when
left to itself, invariably gravitates to the dip and never
to the rise.

This part of the study probably meets the case of the
shallower mines. That is to say, if the drum be suffi-
ciently tapered to do away with lateral friction, the
taper will, in many cases, go far to solve the question of
balance also. The writer has dealt with each case—slip,
spread, and lateral friction — on its individual merits.
The case of balance is more difficult and more debatable,
and the situation, so far as it has now been surveyed,
is that of the shallower mines, where balance is
less important and where an endless rope system might
qot be so unquestionably desirable as it is where mines
are deeper and ropes much heavier.

However, it may be better to defer the consideration
of the more highly theoretical case—that of balance by
plain tapered drums—to a future paper. The rest of
the paper—that dealing with balance—will be submitted
to the institute as soon as possible.

RETAIL COAL PRICES.

We continue in this and following issues a digest of the
evidence given by witnesses heard before the Com-
mittee appointed by the Board of Trade to enquire into
the causes of the present rise in the retail price of coal
sold for domestic use.

Colliery Agents and Retail Prices.

On March 3, Mr. James Richardson was examined. He
said he was connected with the Inland Collieries Subscrip-
tion Room. It was, he said, a kind of a home in London
for colliery agents on the Coal Exchange where they met
before the market. Witness said he himself was connected
with the Sheffield Coal Company, the Birley Collieries, and
the Dinnington Main Collieries. The only real business
side of the concern was that they had with the merchants a
joint committee for arbitrating on small disputes between
the merchants and the colliery people. It was not a society
with any official power at all. The colliery owners had not
got any society where they could determine what the prices
should be; they could advise, and they occasionally had
meetings before the bulk of the contracts were fixed in June
for the following year, but no one was compelled to attend
them, and the recommendations and resolutions which were
passed had no really binding effect upon any of them,
although they did for the most part follow them. When
prices were going up everybody was strong; when they were
coming down nobody was there. Mr. Maurice Deacon
usually acted, when any joint conferences were held, for
the whole of the societies, and asked them to meet together.

Witness said some of the agents were immediately
interested in the question of retail prices. Those agents
who might be paid a commission on pit prices would benefit
by an advance in prices, but those who were paid on tonnage
would not. The agents had some influence in the fixing of
prices, in that they always got the best price they could for
the coal they had to sell, but he did not think that any
agent had sufficient influence or power to say that prices
should be a certain figure. They were frankly competitors.

According to Mr. Richardson, the current prices only
applied to a small percentage, say, in their own case they
were contracted for 75 to 90 per cent, of their output; the
surplus would be selling from January up to the time of
speaking at from 2s. to 7s. or 8s. per ton advance, and, in a
few instances, a shilling more. The output was reduced by
about one-third. He had been able to carry out all their
contracts under the clauses which they had, reducing the
contract quantities proportionately to the reduction of the
output. The clause to which he referred was one providing
that in case of strikes, accidents, or other occurrences over
which they had no control, the contracts were in abeyance,
wholly or partially, in proportion to the stoppage. Of course,
they had some contracts where the strike clauses did not
apply, and so long as they had any output they were com-
pelled to send. The County Council and Government con-
tracts were not fixed for monthly quantities, but as required.
They had the power to demand from the output, and the
collieries sent it on as required. In doing that they were
guided more by a sense of public duty than anything else.
The rise in price, he thought, was simply supply and
demand. Their customers had come to them and said,
“ Let us have coal,” and they had practically taken their
price. However, they all paid alike; one man did not come
and outbid another. It was very hard to say how these
things came about, but one got to know by enquiries, and
by what people were likely to give, what the figure should
be. It seemed to fix itself without any arrangement at all.
They had some sliding-scale contracts and some fixed.
Those prices were fixed by the Coal Merchants’ Association,
and without any conference at all with the collieries or
colliery agents. They tried to aim at about half the one and
half the other. They did not like to have too many sliding-
scale contracts, because they were then entirely in the hands
of the merchants. The colliery prices were advanced on the
publicly advertised prices of best Silkstone, and it would be
possible for the merchants to rig that figure with the Silk-
stone if it were too much in the collieries’ favour. Whenever
there was a great demand for coal there was always a ten-
dency to level up prices from the bottom; that is the
common coals got almost to the same price as the best coals.
During the last coal strike coal of all descriptions, from the
very commonest to the very best, got to a level price of <£1
per ton at the pit, and the London prices were also on level
figures for the best and the worst coals. The common coal

was the coal which they had the greatest dfficulty in fixing
for. Their own common coals were nearly all sold for gas-
making arid purposes of that description, and there was no
sliding scale on triose contracts. It was household coal at the
present time, and he should say that coal was being diverted
from the gasworks to other classes of consumers. Again,
there was a lot of hard steam coal being used for household
coals which usually did not come witriin that grade. As
regards the basis, witness explained that supposing best
Silkstone was 12s. 6d. a ton at the pit as a minimum, some
grades of coal lower in quality might be at 10s. Then when
an advance in best Silkstone was made to the extent of Is.
per ton, 6d. per ton would go on to the lower quality. The
rise in price of the inferior qualities would be an advantage
to the merchant rather than to the colliery. If the best
coal had gone from 28s. to 36s._, a rise of 8s., there would
be a rise of 4s. at the colliery, so far as it was contract coal.
That would equally be the case with an inferior coal sold
at 22s., and now sold at 34s.; instead of one-half the 12s.
going to the colliery, only 4s. had gone. Witness thought
the industrial coal was not being diverted from use in
English manufactories to household use, but coal which
would otherwise have been used for export. The reduction
of export had placed a certain amount of industrial coal at
the disposal of household users in this country. In normal
times witness thought that half the London supply of coal
came in by water, and half by rail. The most of what came
by water would be a large quantity of gas coal, but still,
there was a large quantity of that coal used for household
purposes south of the Thames. Witness said that in some
instances collieries had not a sufficiently large business in
London for an agent, and they did their business direct.
But in the case of all the collieries who had a large business
in London it was done by their agents. There might be a
few exceptions, say, if the collieries were making very large
contracts with the railway companies or steamship com-
panies, they might prefer to do that. As an agent he had
to consult principals about prices. Eor orders at current
prices the collieries usually took the advice of their agents.
Generally speaking, the ordinary business could be settled
by the London agent. Collieries nearly always put before
their agents, say at the present time : “ We are down 33£
per cent, in output, and the standing charges of the colliery
have all to be put upon the two-thirds remaining,” which
ran up the average price very much. It took a good many
tons of the free coal to make any appreciable difference on
the average price.

Witness said the Coal Merchants’ Association fixed the
prices to the public. All the collieries did was to fix a
minimum below which they could not go; they could sell at
what price they liked below it, but they must not pay the
collieries below the minimum. Witness said the proportion
of sliding-scale and fixed contracts was approximately the
same for all grades of coal, but there was a larger proportion
of free coal of the commoner qualities. Witness thought
the prices were fixed by about half-a-dozen big people. He
admitted that the merchants had sometimes been urged to
raise prices by the agents in order that the colliery com-
panies should share on the sliding-scale plan. There were
times when the prices were so low that they were losing
money, and then they urged the merchants to advance them,
but they had not done so lately.

Mr. Richardson said the Government told them that they
did not object to their taking from the end of the contract
the reduced output; the collieries went on delivering to
them, and when they had exhausted the full quantity, minus
the shortages from January, they would say, ‘‘ We will buy
from you again.” The Office of Works had accepted that
condition. They were applying at the present time to the
London County Council to do the same, and also to the
Metropolitan Asylums Board.

With regard to current prices for free coal, witness was
asked to say which was the more accurate statement of what
happened—that the merchants put up prices, and therefore
the collieries thought they were justified in charging the
merchants more; or the collieries put up prices, and there-
fore the merchants thought they were justified in charging
the public more? Witness thought the initiative came
mostly from the merchants’ end, except under circumstances
like the present, when the supply was not equal to the
demand. At present, mainly the merchants were charging
higher prices because the collieries were charging them
higher prices.

Witness said their difficulties with regard to wagons had
not been anything like so serious as with a good many
other collieries. They had been stopped for an hour or two
now and again for want of wagons, but, generally speaking,
they had been fairly well served, as they had also two or
three railway companies attending on them. But the
working of the wagons was extremely bad. Now and again
a few wagons got into a backwater and stopped there a few
weeks. Looking ahead to the time of making new con-
tracts, witness was strongly of opinion that there would be
a considerable advance in prices. The contract price obtain-
able for coal for gasworks, even in South America, would
have a bearing on the household prices here. Even if there
were, say, an adequate supply of household coal in prospect
for the United Kingdom, the price would still depend to a
certain extent on the contract prices for industrial coal here
and in other parts of the world. It would be an extremely
difficult thing to fix a maximum price, because if it was 10s.
at the pit it would mean a varying price at the delivery
points. In fixing the price of coal in London, it was the
price of free coal at the pithead which, to some extent,
controlled the colliery price, but it was not altogether the
determining factor. There was also the price for current
coal. At a time like the present, however, witness thought
that the merchant was apt to forget about his contract
entirely. He was unable to say how far they were already
under contract for supplying their contract coal. They
made contracts with householders, but the poor consumer
had the full price to pay for the cwt.

A Winchester Experiment.

Mr. Arnold Tebbutt gave evidence with regard to the
supply of house coal in Winchester. He said the mayor, on
his own initiative, approached the London and South-
Western Railway, and afterwards convened a meeting of
the coal merchants. Following this, a scheme was drawn
up, which was agreed to by the coal merchants, excepting
in the case of two. One of them was a very small man
indeed, and the other was a larger trader. The scheme
was in force, but the dissentients had received practically
the whole benefit which had arisen to the other merchants
through it, and they had none of the disadvantages. It
was understood at first that the railway company would
give special facilities to those who joined in the scheme as
against those who did not, but they found it impracticable
to do so, as it was illegal. The price agreed on—namely,

33s. per ton net, was the market price in operation at the
end of December, but since then it had been modified,
increases having taken place on two occasions since then.
From the merchants’ point of view the advantages had been
that they had got a regular supply of coal, although perhaps
not in such quantities as they would have liked. The great
advantage had been in the fact of the working of the
trucks, as they had made double the number of journeys
which they had done previously. The railways had given
special facilities to allow the trucks to come right through.
They had been able to make up their trainloads irrespective
of who the coal was for and how short the merchants’ stocks,
because it was all thrown into one pool, and also one object
was to have a sufficient number of trucks coming through
for all the merchants. The disadvantage from the
merchants’ point of view had been the cost which had been
involved, because they had to have special men to take
charge of the numbers of the trucks and what was coming
into stock, and what had gone out to the various merchants.
The only way in which they could get the trucks unloaded
within the time specified—namely, four or five hours, was
by the merchants all being willing to pool their coal
together. When they had released their trucks, the
merchants were at liberty to begin and draw their coal from
the common heap. That involved the expense of having a
person to take note of the coal that went out to the various
merchants; but what was a more expensive and important
item thrown on the merchants was the fact that they had to
keep their horses in the stables while their men were
unloading the trucks, so that perhaps they lost their first
journey or three or four hours’ work in the day with their
horses and men. No attempt was made to classify the coal.
The mayor in his statement simply said that the merchants
would not be able to give a guarantee on the question of
quality. The tendency has undoubtedly been to get an
inferior quality of coal. They had tried to guard against it
as far as they could by saying that nobody should buy a
coal below a certain quality; but it had had the tendency
to bring down the quality even to what could be defined
as that of the lower classes of coal. If they were beginning
over again they ought to have had two different heaps, one
for the better house coal, sitting-room coal, and one inferior
coal for kitchen purposes. The difficulty about that was that
the railway company said : “ We will only take 10 trucks of
coal and put them into the sidings, and you must clear them
wherever they happen to be standing.” Undoubtedly the
prices in Winchester had been less under this scheme than
in other towns in Hampshire where the rates were the
same and they were of a similar kind. That was more
especially so with regard to the question of the poor people
who bought their coal from hawkers by a cwt. at a time.
This scheme had not touched the question of steam coal or
troop coal; they had been specially provided.

Witness said that one-third of their sales were based on
contract. They were almost all based on a summer and
winter price, six months summer and six months winter,
the winter price being Is. above the summer price Many
were only getting 50 per cent, at the present time of the
current quantities. The merchants consented to an addi-
tional charge of Is. 3d. a ton for colliery trucks, which was
double the usual charge in the south of England. Merchants
had been driven into the position of saying that if they
wanted early supply it was no good going to the collieries.
The only way was to go to factors, and say, ‘‘Now what
can you supply me at in a week’s time and guarantee
delivery to me? ” A colliery would say : “ If you like to
pay me 4s. or 5s. extra I have half-a-dozen trucks standing,
an,d I will let you have those.” As to how factors were
able to get the coal from the collieries, first of all, they got
their proportion; they were very large contractors with the
collieries. They also had their own trucks in very large
numbers, and they also met on the London market the
colliery proprietor, and they said to him, ‘‘We must have
some coal; what have you got? ” The colliery proprietor
said : ‘ ‘ I have 100 trucks of so-and-so; if you will pay me
so much money I will let you have them ’ ’; and the factor
said, “ Very well, I will take them.” They would charge
him 2s. or 3s. a ton above the ordinary colliery price, and
then he came down and said, “ I can let you have some coal
for immediate delivery. I shall want a couple of shillings
a ton profit on it,” or Is. according to how the market was
going. The factors had continually told witness they had
practically sold the whole of their month’s supply of contract
coal within the first week of the month, otherwise they would
have to send their coal to London and keep it there, selling
it from hand to mouth as they got it. If all factors were
swept out of existence there might be great difficulty in
small people getting supplied with coal.

Mr. E. W. Winch, secretary of the Guinness Trust,
which owns a lot of workmen’s dwellings in London, and
on their behalf makes special arrangements for supplying
coal to the tenants, said they sold it as nearly as possible
at cost price. The superintendent and porter got a small
commission of Is. a ton, which they divided between them
for the wear and tear of their clothes, and they also charged
for the shed Is. 6d. a week. As against Is. lid. per cwt.
outside, their tenants were paying Is. 3d., but, of course,
the great difference was that they did not give credit. The
trolley men come round on Sundays and collect the money.

Messrs. Cory’s Interests.

Mr. Hamilton Greig, managing director of Messrs. Cory
and Sons, said the firm dealt almost entirely in industrial
coal. Rickett’s was the section of their house which did the
retail business in house coal. Without going into detail,
in 1896 William Cory and Son amalgamated with some
10 big firms in London, two or three of which did a certain
amount of retail business. Rickett Smith was a different
entity, and in 1899 amalgamated their retail portion
with Rickett Smith, and that formed the company of
Rickett, Cockerell and Company Limited. They also had a
controlling interest in Rickett’s and Herbert Clarke. The
firm had an interest of £8,000 in one colliery in Northumber-
land.

Speaking of the process of fixing prices, witness said
supposing, for instance, in an advance, if Rickett, Cockerell
felt they were getting full of orders they would probably
go on the market and mention the matter to the other prin-
cipal merchants that it was their proposal to go up Is. on
the following day. If some merchants did not want to go
up they would say so. They would say, “ No, we do not
think we will go up.” That would naturally prevent anyone
going up. It was simply done informally. There were no
meetings in offices to regulate prices in any shape or form.
Naturally the collieries would induce the merchants to
advance the price, because then their prices advance accor-
dingly, but there was no ring or attempt to rig prices in
any shape or form. Talking of the colliery owners, it was
governed to a very great extent by what they could do in