Coal: Common Market Means Redundancy

from Scottish Miner (May, 1967) Cuts in coal output caused the number of miners. in the Six Common Market countries to fall by 10 per cent last year - over 62,000 men, And a rise in redundancies is feared this year, This is revealed in the 15th Annual Report issued last month of the goa Coal and Steel mersigon High Authority. Coal output will be down to 170 million tons by 1970 it scnibiaie, with a. further drastic fall in the number of miners, This year output will be 192 million tons, Last year, output in the Six was 210 million tons which itself was a 6.2 per cent drop from the 1965 output of 224 million tons. Moreover, short-time working in the pits was widespread. It caused a loss of 4,5 million tons of coal - twice as much as in 1965. Oil imports were stepped up by 10%, Half the energy requirements of the Six is now met by imported oil. But lower overall economic growth and depressed steel output were just as much responsible as oil imports for coal sales falling, Says the Report: "Surplus production (in the Six) in 1966 was considerably higher than in previous years, despite a major reduction in output.” Two months ago, the Six agreed to subsidise the price of coking coal to bring it into line with the cheap coking coal being imported from America by steel plants, Over ten million dollars is now being paid out every year in the shape of tiding-over and re-training allowances compared with 3 to 4 million dollars only four years ago, The High Authority is also now pressing for further concentration of the steel industry and a cut in output. Investment in the steel industry has been falling - "a disquieting trend" says the High Authority. Yet it is urging Common Market companies to "tailor production to demand and not to attempt, by granting discounts of every sort and kind, to sell extra tonnages on a market that cannot absorb them." It gives an ominous warning that it may use its powers under the E.C.S.C. Treaty to impose what it calls "some degree of discipline among the producers," The High Authority also states that "discipline in the steel market can be strengthened if the top-level policy decisions are in progressively fewer hands." "How people like Lord Robens can urge Britain to join the Common Market in face of these facts is beyond me," says Scottish Area NUM Vice- President Michael McGahey. "It would really seal the fate of Britain's coal industry if we did," he added. Since the Common Market was formed in 1958 the number. of miners in the Six has dropped by over 400,000 to 650,000,