AGY-4978 | Royal Commission of Inquiry into the Coal Industry

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The Royal Commission on the Coal Industry consisted of three Commissioners, Colin George Watt Davidson - Chairman of the Commission and Judge of the NSW Supreme Court, Herbert William Gepp - Chairman of the Development and Migration Commission, and Leonard Keith Ward - Government Geologist of South Australia. The Commission was directed to inquire into and make recommendations upon the present position of the coal industry including the production, carriage, export, distribution and sale of coal, the causes which have led to the present position of the coal industry, and to inquire into and make recommendations regarding the distribution of powers between the Commonwealth and the States in relation to the coal industry, including:
• the inter-relation between shipping and other interests
• the capitalisation of collieries and related enterprises
• the cost of production of coal
• the profits or losses of collieries and related enterprises
• the present methods of extracting coal, considered in relation to conservation of resources for future needs
• efficiency of management and marketing
• efficiency of labour
• relations between employers and employees
• the practicality of collective bargains made between miners’ organisations and mine owners
• the importation of coal
• the economic value of coal
• the reorganisation of the industry. (1)

A subsequent letter from the Acting Premier of NSW on 19 June 1929 asked that an inquiry about the amount of profit per ton made by a group of colliery proprietors for the year of 1927 be conducted. (2) In its Interim Report the Commission examined the expenses incurred in the production, distribution, and administration of coal production, concluding that profits from the sale of coal should be considered against other costs such as wages, insurance, depreciation and replacement of equipment. (3)

When the Commission returned to its original Inquiry, it determined that the ultimate objects of the investigation should be to describe the present position of the coal industry, to examine the effects and causes of that position, and to make recommendations for the reorganisation of the industry. It examined the coal resources of Australia compared to the rest of the world, alienation of coal from the Crown, royalties and wayleaves, conservation of coal resources, utilisation of coal, the economic value of coal, the history of the regulation of industrial development, the internal organisation and relations within the coal mining industry, existing defects and proposed remedies, the efficiency of the industry, wage rates, earnings, anomalies and standards, production costs, working expenses, profits and capital, marketing of coal and interstate trade, importation from abroad, consumption and export overseas, over-capacity in NSW, effects and causes of the present position and the reorganisation of the industry. (4)

After examining aspects of the coal industry, the Commission was of the opinion that the two basic problems consisted of an over-capacity and over-manning of the mines, and a spirit of hostility between capital and labour. It recommended the closure of a number of mines and the transfer of surplus labour to other occupations, plus considered the viability of several different options including nationalisation, collective contracting, profit sharing and industrial co-partnership, rationalisation, and publicity of facts and intensive control. (5)

The Commission also recommended that a Board, consisting of three appointed members, be established to control the industry (6), with the legislatures of the Commonwealth and NSW framing the necessary enactments to enable the proposed Board to exercise essential functions. In the interim, it was recommended that a Board be set up immediately with its powers limited to determining a maximum selling price for coal, wage rates, and labour conditions, until it was vested with the authority to effect full control of the industry. (7)

Endnotes
1.Royal Commission on the Coal Industry, Parliamentary Papers 1929-30, Vol.3, p.303.
2.ibid, p.310.
3.ibid, p.313-14.
4.ibid, p.330-34.
5.ibid, p.642-43.
6.ibid, p.647.
7.ibid, p.659.