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CHAPTER VIII,

On all grounds, we recommend the gradual supersession of the raising
contractor as such, and the substitution of what ig known as sarkar:
working.

Labour Officers,

If the raising contractor is eliminated, it will ordinarily be
hecessary to strengthen the management in order to carry out the funetions
 he performed. There are very few mines employing raising contractors
 where the time of the manager is not fully occupied already,
and we recognise that his other duties would normally make it impossible
for him to give adequate personal attention to labour matters. In some
cases we fear that the manager is imperfectly acquainted with the languages
native to the workers. This may be one of the reasons for the survival
of the raising contractor, but it does not make him indispensable. We
recommend that in every important mine there should be a salaried
officer directly responsible to the management for the supervision of
labour, both in and outside the mine. There may be some among the
existing labour contractors who are qualified by experience and temperament
 for such positions ; but, whoever is appointed, it is essential that
be should be able to secure and maintain the confidence of the workers,
Regularity of Working.
So far as working time is concerned, the principal aim should
be greater regularity. The combined effect of seasonal absences and the
short week worked by most miners is to reduce the number of the average
miner’s working days to well below half the days of the year. Hours
of work (with which we deal later) are also frequently irregular. These
irregularities are disliked by coal owners and managers, but it is possible
that the employment of raising contractors tends to obscure the extent
to which they handicap the industry. In overhead charges, in the cost
of housing and sanitation and in other ways the employment of men
working, perhaps, on 150 days in the year greatly enhances the cost
and lowers the remuneration of labour. Greater regularity of work
would be to the immediate advantage both of employers and employed.
We can put forward no panacea which will effect a revolution in
the present irregular methods of work ; but there are directions along
which progress is possible. In the first place, irregular daily attendance
is associated with long working days. So long as a man, on the days
when he goes underground, is required, or even permitted, to remain
there for 12 hours at a stretch, it is unreasonable to expect him to present
himself for work on 6 days of the week, even if it were legal for him to work
more than 54 hours a week. No worker, least of all one who is drawn
from the open fields, is likely to be ready, save in cases of dire necessity,
regularly to spend long hours underground. The shortening of hours,
therefore, to which we refer later, appears essential if greater regularity
of attendance is to be secured.

Drink and Drugs.

A second factor, which has some influence on the regularity of
work, is the consumption of intoxicating liquor. The extent of the