December 17, 1915.

THE COLLIERY GUARDIAN.

1243

At a meeting of the Institution of Mechanical
Engineers this evening (Friday), Mr. R. M.
Walmsley, D.Sc., will contribute a paper entitled
“ Engineering Colleges and the War.”

The appeal of the Glamorgan County Council in
the action brought against them by the Glamorgan
Coal Company and the Powell Duffryn Coal Com-
pany to recover money expended in feeding and
housing police imported into the district to deal with
the Tonypandy riots of 1910, came before the Court
of Appeal during the week. Judgment was
reserved.

An important colliery rating case (D. Davis and
Sons v. Pontypridd Union Assessment Committee)
was heard in the Divisional Court, on Thursday of
last week. Judgment was in favour of appellants.

To-morrow (Saturday) at Bolton, Lord Derby will
inspect the motor ambulances which have been con-
tributed conjointly by the owners and miners of the
district.

In the King’s Bench Division on Wednesday, the
appeal was allowed in the case of Atkinson v. Lewis
Merthyr Consolidated Collieries, which arose out of
the Senghenydd explosion.

Meetings of the North of England Institute of
Mining and Mechanical Engineers, and of the
Mining Institute of Scotland were held on Saturday
last.

It seems to the ordinary man a
Coal perversion of economic principles
Exports that our coal exports should have to
and the be curtailed just at the time when
War. the strain upon our finances, due to
the war, demands an increased
export trade to balance the excess of our imports.
Coal is an ideal asset for this purpose. It is a raw
material of which we still possess an inexhaustible
supply, so far as the immediate needs of ourselves
and some generations of our descendants are
concerned. It has a sure market, and is in steady
and increasing demand. It is even urgently
needed both by our Allies and neutral countries.
Yet we read that last week as many as 7,000 Welsh
miners were idle, and 85,000 tons of output were
lost owing to scarcity of tonnage wherewith to carry
on the export trade. This is no temporary condition,
but one that has become almost a chronic feature of
this branch of our coal industry. It seems to be a
part of the irony of things that, just when the
market value of coal in foreign markers stands high,
we should be in the position of being powerless to
take advantage of our monopoly in this particular
commodity,

Is there no available remedy, or is it just our
usual luck ? That is a question which we leave the
Government to answer, for we cannot pretend to
know all the factors which govern the present
situation. In a general sense, of course, it can be
understood that a great strain has been thrown
upon our shipping facilities by the extraordinary
demands for military transport, but can we be
satisfied that our organisation is as perfect as is
possible, or is it that coal exports are deemed to be
of such secondary importance that this branch of
trade can be safely left to take its chance ?

If that is the view of the Board of Trade, it is
certainly not that of our Allies across the Channel.
In France, every effort has been made to relieve the
urgent demands of Paris and to facilitate the import
of British coal, to relieve a situation which at one
time threatened to be little short of disaster.

In times of peace, Paris consumes annually
something over 5,000,000 tons of coal. Of this
quantity, about 56 per cent, was derived from the
coalfields of the Nord and the Pas-de-Calais, about
19 per cent, from Belgium and Germany, and the
remainder was divided between Great Britain and
the central French coalfields. The position now
is such that approximately 80 per cent, of the coal
used in Paris depends upon imports from Great
Britain to a single French port, Rouen. But this
port, in the early stages of the war, was totally
unprepared and was inadequately equipped for the
purpose of dealing with coal imports on such an
augmented scale. The French Chamber of Commerce,

however, has been equal to the occasion. Since the
war, there have been installed 16 new cranes. An
order has been placed in England for six large
electric cranes, to be delivered in the spring. A
similar installation, purchased in America, has now
been shipped. About a dozen floating cranes,
belonging to German companies, have been com-
mandeered for service in the port, two electric coal
transporters, of a capacity of 1,000 tons a day, have
been set up by the State Railways, and about 3,000
German prisoners have been told off to attend to the
discharge' of the colliers on the river side.

The result of this activity has been most successful,
and Rouen has been transformed into a great coaling
port, capable of dealing effectively with all the coal
that arrives from British ports.

The cost of British coal in France has naturally
increased enormously. There has been a two-fold
influence tending towards this increase, part of which
is due to internal conditions at home, and part to the
abnormal rise in freights. Thus, the f.o.b. prices of
Durham gas coals rose from 13s. in January last to
23s. in August. Newcastle steam coals rose from
13s. 3d. to 22s. Cardiff small steam coal rose from
10s. to 20s., and even Swansea anthracite has
increased from 22s. to 27s. per ton. Freights, in the
meantime, have gone up by leaps and bounds.
Before the war the average rate from British ports
was 4s. 6d. per ton. It has since exceeded 20s., but
has shown meanwhile many fluctuations, standing
at the beginning of last month at 18s. 9d. from the
Tyne to Rouen, and 15s. 6d. from Cardiff. The
figures now are considerably higher, ranging from
27s. 6d. from the Tyne to 22s. 6d. from Cardiff. On
the top of this, Paris buyers have to pay from
3 fr. 25 c. to 5 fr. 75 c. for river transport from
Rouen, as well as port charges at Rouen, the total
cost amounting to something between 60 and 100
francs per ton, without reckoning merchants’ profits
and the cost of distribution in Paris.

Let the people of London ponder over these
figures. The Limitation of Prices Act does not, of
course, affect export coal, the cost of which is mainly
influenced by market conditions. Our chief object in
calling attention to them here is to emphasise the
fact that an urgent demand for coal exists in France,
and our true economic policy would appear to be to
encourage exports to the utmost extent consistent
with our military and naval requirements. It can
scarcely be a sign of efficient organisation that
thousands of our miners should be condemned to
compulsory idleness because such conditions exist.

We are not now criticising the restrictions in coal
exports under the licence system, for which there is
obvious justification. But we would urge upon the
Board of Trade the paramount importance of facili-
tating the export of surplus coal, every ton of which
will go to balance its equivalent in imports.

To buy in the cheapest market is

Pit Props. a gratifying privilege in times of
peace, but it may lead to disillusion-
ment in war time, when not only are previous
savings liable to be swallowed up, but a nation, as
experience shows, may be compelled to adopt
extravagant methods for the purpose of overtaking
the results of unpreparedness. This is abundantly
illustrated in the present war, which has placed in
jeopardy some of our most vital industries, because
we had relied upon the foreigner for certain indis-
pensable adjuncts. Thus the textile industry
depended almost entirely upon Germany for certain
aniline dyes. Other great national industries have
been thrown out of gear by the scarcity of chemical
products. Even in the case of many of our minor
manufactures we have trusted to the foreigner to
supply certain parts, no longer available in war time,
and impossible to make at home without special and
expensive machinery. It was not considered worth
our while in time of peace to set up this plant,
because a cheap source of foreign supply was at
hand. Disciples of Cobden have gloated, with much
complacency, over the advantages thus accruing to
British industries, and the benefits of free trade and
open markets—admitted under certain qualifications
—have became a political fetish upheld, without
rhyme or reason, on the mere score of present gain.

The dependence of the coal mining industry upon
imported pit props is another example of this same
principle. During the last 15 years the quantity of
imported pit props has been steadily growing.
From 1,880,000 loads in 1901, the quantity of pit
timber brought into this country has increased until
in 1913 as many as 3,451,000 loads have arrived in
this country from France, Scandinavia, Portugal and
Russia. In the 11 months of this year we have paid
no less than £4,324,669 for pit timber imported
from these countries.

At the same time we have been threatened with a
serious shortage in the supply of pit timber, and the
coal industry has been saddled with a considerable
increase in working costs in consequence. It is not
possible to state precisely what has been the added
tonnage cost which has thus been brought about.
Possibly we may estimate the timber cost of a colliery
at the present time at anything between 3d. and
Is. per ton according to circumstances, and, as no
very suitable substitute has yet come into use, the
present position can scarcely be considered otherwise
than serious.

The Government has for some years been alive to
the desirability of encouraging afforestation in this
country, and some progress in this direction has
been made. We note, therefore, with satisfaction
the appointment by Lord Selborne of a strong
committee to examine the present position for the
purpose of ascertaining how far our native timber
can be relied upon for supplying existing demands.
The Board of Agriculture and Fisheries have lately
estimated that at the end of 1914 the United
Kingdom held one and a-half years’ supply of
pitwood, and in a speech delivered on Monday night
at the Surveyors’ Institution, before the English
Forestry Association, Lord Selborne hinted at the
important place which English-grown pit wood might
be expected to take in our coal fields in the near
future.

Unfortunately the position of English forestry has
not yet been sufficiently well established to enable us
to deal adequately with the present crisis. Although
English pit props are to some extent finding their
way into our collieries, their quality has not met wfith
universal favour. Quickly-grown timber is a poor
substitute for the mature products of old-established
forests. Although cheaper than imported wood, it
does not work out to advantage if it is soft and cuts
to waste. At the same time it is not impossible that
these disadvantages may be in part attributable to
bad selection. Lord Selborne’s Committee might
find it useful to consider this point of view. If, by
injudicious felling of immature trees, the quality has
proved to be inferior, the good name of home-grown
timber might yet be saved by the exercise of greater
discrimination.

To some extent the inferiority of British timber is
a direct result of too rapid growth and too open a
condition of our woodlands, leading to an excessive
breadth of the annual rings of growth. The subject
of English timber has recently been considered in
detail by Mr. M. C. Duchesne in a paper read before
the Surveyors’ Institute. In referring to the possible
influence of the war upon the management of our
woods, Mr. Duchesne expressed the hope that
land owners would recognise the importance of
growing timber on short rotations for pitwood and
colliery requirements. He believes that pure crops
of Douglas fir on short rotations for pit wood, leaving
a proportion of the crop for sleepers, will be a suit-
able procedure, in view of the unlimited market
produced by our annual consumption in this country
of 4J million tons of pitwood. He also looks with
confidence towards some relief from the present high
railway charges for home pit wood—a matter which
is all the more serious by reason of the scattered
distribution of our supplies.

It is understood that the Government wishes to
encourage land owners and land agents to sell their
timber, as it stands, to the Board of Agriculture.
This is an excellent proposal because it relieves the
land owner from all further trouble in felling and
marketing—an item of no little importance in view
of the scarcity of labour which must be felt on large
estates. Some hesitation, however, is apparently
experienced with regard to the position of timber