244 REPORTS ON THE STATE OF SCIENCE, ETC. 
Chairman in February last (now, however, safely passed through), necessitating 
his relinquishing all his professional work and public duties for three months, 
the Committee has not been able to fulfil the programme of work which it 
proposed a year ago. Accordingly, it cannot present this year anything in the 
nature of an extended Report, but must confine itself to a brief general state- 
ment as to the present fuel situation, and to the importance of its future work 
and plans in relation thereto. 
The Coal Situation.—In its previous Reports, and particularly in the one 
presented at Bournemouth in 1919, the Committee has repeatedly warned the 
country of the serious economic dangers attendant upon the rapidly increasing 
cost of producing coal in British mines. Last year it published official 
statistics showing how rapidly our coal export trade was declining. Some 
important statistics upon these points were given in a paper upon ‘ The 
Economics of the South Wales Coalfield, which Mr. Hugh Bramwell read at 
the joint meeting of this Committee with that of the South Wales Institute 
of Engineers at Cardiff on August 26, 1920. Among them were the following 
which, referring to a group of South Wales collieries, ‘illustrate in detail the 
relation between the production per person employed per pit working day and 
the earnings per person employed, also per pit working day, for the past six 
years, plotted weekly, and averaged each six months’ :— 
Earnings |Production 
per per 
Period. Duration. person person 
employed | employed 
per pit per pit 
day. day. 
8s. d. Tons. 
1 No. 1 Pay 1915 to No. 22 Pay 1916. 
Prior to 15 per cent. advance . 7 1:30 0-768 
2 No. 23 Pay 1916 to No. 37 Pay 1917. 
Period of 15 per cent. advance . 8 11-40 0-758 
3 No. 38 Pay 1917 to No. 26 ra 1918. 
Ist War Wage addition . 10 8:79 0-742 
4 No. 27 Pay 1918 to No. 1 Pay 1919. 
2nd War Wage addition . 11 11-03 0-718 
5 No. 2 Pay 1919 to No. 29 Pay 1919. 
Sankey Wage addition . 13 7-84 0-677 
6 No. 30 Pay 1919 to No. 17 Pay 1920. 
Hours reduced 8 to 7 and piecework 
rates increased by 14-2 per cent. 14 3:15 0-561 
7 No. 18 Pay 1920. Additional 20 a cent. 
onearmings . — — 
On March 11 last the Secretary for Mines officially reported the following 
comparative statistics concerning our British coal industry in the years 1913 and 
1920, respectively :— 
Average Cost of Producing a Ton of Coal in Great Britain. 
1913 1920 
aU 8. di 
Wages : : : . ’ oer Ged 25 94 
Timber, Stores, and other costs a 4 5 : ‘ 110 Time 
Royalties . A A . 2 - : é a O\om 0 72 
Total Cost . ; 74 34 1}t 
Add Owners’ profits . é 5 : : : <a.l.. 8 2 6} 
—— 
