January 17, 1913

THE COLLIERY GUARDIAN.

181

gases which are liable to be encountered would prove
fatal to the wearer, whereas the wastage of even a dozen
bagfuls of oxygen would be inappreciable.

Moreover, with the injector type of apparatus there
is no warning of a leak, whereas in the “ Proto,” with
its extremely handy pressure gauge, any undue loss of
gas is readily detected, and a man would have time to
reach a place of safety even if the wastage were much
greater than the amount mentioned above.

Several of the letters which have already appeared go
to show that the writers do not understand the subject.

Henry A. Fleuss.

187, Westminster Bridge-road, London, S.E.,
January 9, 1913.

THE POLICY OF 41 DON’T KNOW ”

Sir,—The position of the colliery manager under the
Coal Mines Act of 1911, sections 15 and 16, is not at all
clear. Suppose, for example, that a strike or an
accident occurs, and that it becomes necessary for the
manager to perform pro tern, the duties of a fireman,
deputy or examiner. The question is whether, notwith-
standing his possession of a first-class certificate and
also, perhaps, several years’ experience as a manager,
the law allows him to act as a fireman pro tern. unless he
has also obtained the fireman’s certificate.

Secondly. What about the “ local inspectors ” who
may be appointed, under section 16, by the workmen.
Must these men possess firemen’s certificates ? If not,
must they be conducted by a man who possesses such a
certificate ? The Act says that “ if the owner, agent or
manager thinks fit ” they may be accompanied by
himself or one or more officials of the mine. But the
Act does not say whether any one, even of the latter,
must possess a fireman’s certificate.

Moreover, the local inspectors are to be thus accom-
panied only “ if the owner, agent or manager thinks fit.”
But suppose the manager does not think fit ? In that
case, are the local inspectors, without certificates of any
kind, to be allowed “ to go to every part of the mine, and
to inspect the shafts, roads, levels, workings, airways,
ventilating apparatus, old workings, and machinery ” ?

At the request of a Cumberland colliery manager and
several colliery officials, I wrote to the Home Secretary
on the 2nd inst., asking him to give a ruling on these
points. I now ask you, Sir, to publish his reply, a copy
of which I append, and I shall be glad if you will also
publish the enclosed copy of my rejoinder.

H. W. Halbaum.

Cardiff, January 13, 1913.

[copy.]

Home Office,

Whitehall,

10th January, 1913.

Sir,—With reference to your letter of the 2nd instant, on
the subject of sections 15 and 16 of the Coal Mines Act,
1911, I am directed by the Secretary of State to say that it
is open to any manager who is in doubt on either of the
points which you raise in your letter, to refer to the
inspector of mines, and if any manager has written to you
on the subject I am to suggest that you should advise him
accordingly.	I am, Sir,

Your obedient servant,

Mr. H. W. Halbaum,	Malcolm Delevingne.

“ Avondale/’

7, Mafeking-road, Cardiff.

“ Avondale,”

The Bight Hon. R. McKenna,	7, Mafeking-road,

H.M. Principal Sec. of State,	Cardiff.

Home Department,	January 11, 1913.

Whitehall, S.W.

Sir,—1 am in receipt of your letter of the 10th inst., in
reply to mine of the 2nd inst., on the subject of sections 15
and 16 of the Coal Mines Act, and I note that, after a full
week’s consideration, your answer is to the effect that you
don’t know how these sections are to be interpreted. I must
respectfully protest against the tone of your letter, and, in
order to give effect to that protest, I am sending a copy of
this correspondence to the Press, and also to the various
colliery officials’ associations.

In my letter of the 2nd inst., I asked certain questions,
and you tell me that if a manager in doubt will apply to the
inspector of mines he will be answered. Why may not any
person interested receive a civil answer to the question ?
Either you know, or you don’t know, how these sections are
to be interpreted. If you do know, why not answer my
questions in a straightforward manner. If you don’t know,
how is the inspector to know ? Or am I to understand that
the inspectors have secret instructions from the Home Office
as to the interpretation to be put on the Act ? Or am I to
understand that every manager who happens to be placed
in a difficulty is to be entirely at the mercy of the particular
inspector having charge of the particular district in which
the particular manager conducts his business ?

Allow me to suggest that this sort of thing is hardly
worthy of a Government department. I have been engaged
by the Cumberland Colliery Officials’ Association to give
them two lectures on the 25th and 27th insts., at Whitehaven
and Mary port, and am also invited to attend the South
Wales and Monmouthshire men, and I have been asked to
get such information as I can from the Home Office to
enable them to put a proper interpretation upon the various
provisions of the Coal Mines Act, 1911. These lectures are
advertised as dealing with “Recent Mining Legislation, and
how it affects Colliery Officials.” What am I to tell these
men? Am I to tell them that, having carried out their
instructions to the best of my ability, the Home Office has
refused to give me any information whatever; or am I to
tell them that the Home Secretary does not know in what
way these provisions are to be interpreted ? Or, am I to
tell them that the method of interpretation is a secret to be
divulged only by the inspector of mines to the manager
who asks for advice ? I can only warn you that, if you
refuse to face these questions at the present time, you will
not be allowed to shirk them at the General Election. I have
been a Liberal all my life, but I have now quite made up
my mind that I will spare neither labour nor expense in
order to enable the miners of this country to appreciate
the manner in which they have been be-fooled and
exploited by the department over which you have the
honour to preside.

It is not only that you don’t know, or that you refuse to
state, how these particular sections of your own Act are
to be interpreted. The evidence of your “policy of don’t
know ” in other directions is accumulating and solidifying
itself into a mass that will infallibly crush the Government
at the next General Election. For example, I sent you a
long letter (on September 25 last) pointing out to you
the iniquitous character of the surveying qualification
required by the Board of Examinations from all candidates
for a first-class certificate. You acknowledged the receipt
of that letter, and promised that it should have due
attention. I have heard nothing more about the matter
from you, but I note that when Mr. Adamson, the member
for East Fife, questioned you on the same subject in the
House of Commons, you actually had the assurance to say
that no representations had reached you which would lead
you to think that this requirement would place any serious
difficulty in the way of the class of candidate in question.
Fortunately, I sent copies of my letter of September 25 to
the mining papers, and it received wide publication, so that
all the mining community know perfectly well that strong
representations on the matter had reached you fully three
months before you were questioned on the subject in the
House of Commons. The things you ought to know, but
don’t know, about the mining situation are too numerous to
mention, but some of them are noted below.

You evidently don’t know that coal gas is being used at
the great majority of the firemen’s examination®, and that
these examinations are thereby deprived of the efficiency
which the framers of the Act intended them to have. You
don’t know, I suppose, that the scale of gas caps corres-
ponding to certain percentages of firedamp as given by the
card issued from the Home Office does not agree with the
scale given by the Royal Commission. You don’t know that
each particular examiner for these firemen’s examinations
has his own standard, which, in most cases, does not agree
with the standard issued by the Royal Commission, nor with
that set up by the Home Office. You don’t know, in spite of
your own instruction, that it is not necessary for these
candidates to attend classes, that they are nevertheless
obliged to attend classes, not because they have anything to
learn about firedamp, not because they lack experience in
the detection of firedamp or in the removal of it, but simply
because they are not familiar with the particular standard
set up by the particular examiner they may have to face.
Hence, they are obliged to go to these classes simply to
discover what are the ill-digested views of the amateur who
happens to have been pitchforked into the position of
examiner. You don’t even know, I suppose, that some of
these examiners have said that they accept no standard
issued by the Home Office, nor by the Royal Commission,
nor by any other authority whatever. So that the practical
effect is that any fireman able to pass one examiner must
fail under all the others. Again, you do not know that
county councils do not consist of practical mining men. In
some districts the control and conduct of the examinations
for firemen is in the hands of men who have no practical
experience whatever. Such are the institutions “ approved ”
by you for examining practical men who have forgotten
far more than your “ approved ” teachers ever knew about
the subjects of the examination.

Perhaps, also, you do not know that when the Act of
1872 was passed, acting colliery managers received “ certifi-
cates of service.” Neither do you seem to know that when
the Act of 1887 was passed acting under-managers received
“ certificates of service.” And, therefore, it never occurred
to you that in common justice the precedent established
for managers and under-managers should have been followed
when it became compulsory for firemen to obtain certificates
Your answer to Mr. Adamson on the 1st inst. also shows
that you don’t know what the mining papers are saying, or
what the mining institutions are saying about the methods
I of the Home Office. If you will condescend to look in the

current issue of the Colliery Guardian you will find that
your reply to Mr. Adamson is being severely commented on,
and you will also find there what people are saying about
the recent prosecution (or should I say persecution ?) of the
management of the Bentley Colliery. The amount of
praise lavished on Dr. Haldane for his honourable stand is
only equalled by the volume of condemnation showered
upon the conduct of your department. Finally, you
evidently don’t know that more blocks have been put in the
way of the working class candidate for a manager’s certifi-
cate, and more in the way of his ambition for improved
status generally by your department than have been put in
the way by all the Governments of the last 50 years.

The above forms a list of some of the things which you
evidently don’t know. You will get a rude awakening
when you face your constituents at Monmouthshire at the
next election. I can only counsel you that, in so far as
the mining interests of this country are concerned, and
especially the interests of the working classes connected
therewith, you should endeavour to place yourself in the
hands of advisers who are less steeped in the worst kind
of Tory classism, and more inclined to fall in with the
democratic spirit of modern times than your present
advisers seem to be. I am quite certain that many of the
Orders which have been issued from the Home Office since
the passing of the Coal Mines Act, 1911, would never have
stood the slightest chance of passing the full House of
Commons had they been submitted to discussion there.

I will say, in conclusion, that since it appears to be
impossible to extract any information from you on matters
of public interest to all classes of miners, I shall, in future,
direct my enquiries to members representing the mining
interest. Perhaps the replies you will give these gentlemen
from your place in the House of Commons may be less
evasive and more straightforward than those which you
have condescended to/give to myself. As a start towards
this end I am this day sending to Mr. Adamson, the
member for East Fife, a full account of how the class he
represents has been fooled and duped by your department
ever since you took charge of it, and I shall not fail to
enlighten colliery officials and managers generally as to the
further treatment they may expect at your hands unless
they decide to deal with you and the other members of
this “ most democratic Government of modern times ”
through the ballot box.

I am, Sir,

Your obedient servant,

[1 enclo.]	H. W. Halbaum.

CONTROLLING GEAR ON WINDING ENGINES.

Sir,—I, also, have wondered what safety there is in
the controlling gear for the persons who are riding on
the cage which is descending, for all the controlling
gears act only when the cage has travelled its distance,
and there is nothing to control the descending cage. I
may say that I have designed a contrivance which will
prevent the cages da ihing into the sump planks, which
can be under the control of the enginewinder or can be
actuated by the onsetter.	Controller.

Church-street, Chasetown,

January 13,1911.

TO CORRESPONDENTS.
Durham Gas Coal.

Constant Reader (Parley).—The term ‘‘special Wear
gas coals ” applies mainly to the coals wrought at the
Wear mouth and Londonderry collieries. In addition to
the foregoing the coals obtained from Wheatley Hill and
Wingate Grange collieries are commonly described as “ gas
specials.”

At a meeting of the Manchester section of the Society of
Chemical Industry, held last week, Mr. J. E. Christopher
read a paper on “ Progress in By-product Recovery at
Coke Ovens.” Dealing with the question of the outlets
for the various by-products, Mr. Christopher said in this
country the use of sulphate of ammonia had not made
headway as compared with its use on the Continent. There
was plenty of scope for the work of the Sulphate of
Ammonia Committee, when they considered that out of
our production of 369,000 tons, only 70,000 were used in
this country, while practically the whole of the German
production was used on German soil. The outlets for tar
also appear promising. The main outlet for benzol must
lie in the direction of motor spirit. In 1905 the import of
petroleum spirit into the United Kingdom was 19,459,000,
in 1906 26,335,000, and in 1907 33,180,000. Assuming an
average yield of one gallon of motor benzol per ton of coal,
the coke works of this country could turn out 19 million
gallons annually, so that the field for the exploitation of
benzol as motor spirit was extensive. The production of
gas for purposes of illumination as a by-product of the coke
industry, had lately made considerable headway. In the
six years from 1903 to 1910 the amount of gas produced in
this way in Germany had increased from 13| million
cubic feet to 1,472 million feet, and a company had been
formed to supply coke-oven gas to the municipality of
Ghent, in Belgium, at a price equivalent to 5'4d. per
1,000 cubic feet. In the discussion which followed the
paper, Mr. W. H. Coleman said that if the whole of the coke
made in the country was made with recovery ovens, he
thought they might get about 29 million gallons of benzol.