* * * . The. Budget assumes peace in the
coal industry. As Mr. Churchill significantly said, if there was not peace he would be compelled to. make some entirely new proposals. That means, of course, large additional taxation and. a very destructive undoing of much of his work. When we go to press on Thursday the signs of peace are no better than they were. The Prime Minister's intervention has not yet had its expected results. It was on Thursday, April 22nd, that he took charge of the negotiations as the owners, and the men had quite failed to come to the postulated preliminary agreement about wages. The next day he received representatives of both sides at the Ministry of Labour and asked Mr. Evan, Williams for the owners, and Mr. Herbert Smith for the miners, to state their case. This they did, Mr. Evan Williams laying emphasis on the importance of increasing the working hours and Mr. Smith rejecting all idea of either increasing hours or reducing wages: At the end of these expositions the Prime- Minister remarked that there was a " pretty tight knot." He then invited each side to appoint a negotiating com- mittee of nine members.
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