The following item reprinted from the iuropean Community bulletin. \ throws an interesting sidelight on the operation of the Suropean Coal and Steel Community. We can imagine that once in the Common Market that very similar disp-— utes would take place between between various British interests and the Community organisations. The report reads:
"The High Authority of the Jiuropean Coal and Steel Community has asked the Belgian Government to reconsider its proposals for a Coal Directorate in the light of a possible conflict of powers between the Directorate and the Community The proposals are contained in a Belgian Act of Parliament of November 1961, which provides for direct intervention by the Belgian Government in the operation of the privately owned Belgian coal industry. The High Authority not only supports the Directorate's object of reorganising the Belgian coal industry; it has itelf, since the start of the 2.C.S.C. in 1952, been exerting heavy pressure on the Belgian Government and coal industry to complete the thoroughgoing reorganisation essential if the industry is to stand on its own feet in the Common Market. Between 1953 and 1958 the industry received $53 million in reorganisation aid from the German and Dutch mines, through an 2£.C.S.C. compensation fund plus another $53 million from the Belgian Government. Since then the High Authority has also authorised the Belgian Government to pay the industry approximately $36 million in reorganisation subsidies for the years 1959 to 1961.
Since 1958 some 46 uneconomic — frequently dangerous and outmoded — pits have been closed in Belgium, representing nearly 7 million tons capacity, out of 30 million tons in 19533 since the start of the coal—steel common market productivity has risen from 1.0 to close on 1.8 tons per manshift underground; and the High Authority readaption aid (aid for re~employment and resettlement ) for roughly 38,000 Belgian miners has amounted +o $12.4 million, matched by an equivalentamount from the Belgian Government. The High Authorityalso paid out
$6.8 million (from 1959 to 1961) in additional aid to miners on short time. This year over half the the total Belgian output should come from the lowcost Campine coalfield against less than one-third before the Common Market. However, the H igh Authority has told the Belgian Government that its proposals would, without nationalising the mines, give the Directorate powers which the @.C.S.C. Treaty reserves to the High Authority. In particular the Belgian Government would allow it:
1) to fix prices
(2) to set up sales organisations, or a single national sales organis-
ation
(3) to fix quote production quotas.
The High Authority told the Belgian Government that measures of this sort cannot be taken on a national basis; theycan only be taken by the High Authorityin the interest of the Community as a whole. The Belgian Government claimed in a letter to the High Authority that the Directorate was really a form of nation— alisation, and therefore fully permissible underthe 3.C.S.C. Treaty. The High Authority rejected this view, since the proposals for a Directorate in no way chaged the actualownership of the mines; it added that a sales organisation of the kind contemplated by the Belgian Government would not be a new ‘public company! but an illegal organisation with the characteristics of a cartel. Under article 880f the Paris Treaty the Belgian Government has six weeks to decide whether to submit new plans to the High Authority or whether to take the case to the Commun— ity Court. The Government can also ask the Hie! Authorid ibili
: g4 Authority to assume responsibilit for the recovery of the Belgian coal industry itself, in which case the High ¥ ae would advise the Belgian Government on the best means to achieve this end.
; In questioning the High Authority on its action over th j in the juropean Parliament, Belgian Socialist deputies August de Book oad fone Toubeau said that the measures to reorganise the Belgian coal industry have been inadequate; the Belgian Governemnt has also stated that the powers it secks under the November Act are necessary to ensure the industry's permanent recoverye Replying to the Parliamentary question put to it by lil, de Block and Toubeau, the High. Authority pointed to the recent Signs of strength in Belgian coal. At the same time the Belgian coal users association has petitioned the High Autho1.ity to end Belgian Coal's continued isolation as they claim the industry no longer needs special treatment, and that protection has put up the prices for Belgians, while they remain lower elsewhere in the Community.