MINING SUBSIDENCE (Hansard, 18 April 1944)

§ Mr. Daggar (Abertillery)

I wish to raise an important subject and a very serious one to those living in the mining areas of this country. It is the question of mining subsidence, which is one big feature of these areas, and which requires no definition beyond a reference to the question of the damage due to subsidence both to public and private property. We have asked from time to time that this question should be placed under the consideration, not only of a Commission, but of other bodies, but, as is true of many others, no relief has been provided for those who suffer as the result of subsidence. Even to-day, on this subject, it is impossible to secure from the Government any undertaking or promise that it is proposed to deal with it effectively. We have heard much to-day about rebuilding bombed houses, and other premises, but nothing about repairing the damage due to subsidence

On 2nd March, I put down a Question to the Ministry of Fuel and Power, and I was informed that the matter was being considered in consultation with other Departments. Well, consideration and consultation are two very pleasing words, but to me they appear to be the Government's substitute for Commissions, reports, inquiries and surveys. I sometimes think it would be very difficult to manufacture an excuse, or to excuse delay, without the use of those two very appropriate words. I also asked whether, in any post-war reconstruction plans, consideration would be given to persons who not only had suffered, but continued to suffer loss from subsidence. I was told that it was not a matter for the Ministry to which I addressed the question. Subsequently I made a similar inquiry to the Lord President of the Council, which was then transferred to the Prime Minister and eventually came back to the Ministry of Fuel and Power. That is quite a complicated journey for a simple, straightforward, clear question. This evening, I hope to have a less complicated answer.

170 I know many cases—scores of cases—in my own division of persons who have purchased their own houses, some of which have been rendered uninhabitable because of the coal having been worked underneath them. I would like to give one or two instances affecting the owners of private houses in the area for which the Blaina and Nantyglo Councils are responsible. There are two four-roomed houses which have been rendered uninhabitable and have had to be vacated. Six others at the present moment are affected, of which one seems likely to be vacated. The total number of persons displaced is 14, excluding absent serving men. In one of the houses which is owned by a miner, who is in receipt of a pension, there are no fewer than four persons, four sons, serving in the Fighting Forces, and that is in an area where there are insufficient houses now to meet local requirements. In my submission, reconstruction becomes a farce if provision cannot be made for the repair of houses.

There is another phase of this problem in the case of persons who have houses and are the occupants. The repairs that are necessary cannot be effected because of the inability of the owners. It is inexplicable that the Government did not impose the obligation to effect these repairs upon the persons who received payment for the working of the coal in the form of royalties, instead of which we allowed these individuals, during the period of 20 years, to take from the industry no less than £120,000,000, and we were only able to get rid of them by presenting them with another £70,000,000. As the State now owns the rights to this coal, the Government have a special responsibility to the owners of damaged property. The war has created a peculiar contradiction, which I hope the Government and the Minister will note, and that contradiction finds expression in an Act of Parliament known as the War Damage Act. The owners of these damaged houses in my Division, and in many other Divisions in Great Britain represented by my colleagues, have to assist in the provision of money in respect of houses damaged or demolished by bombs, yet no provision, unless made in the leases, is provided for people whose houses are similarly destroyed or damaged by subsidence. There are additional financial burdens imposed upon these small individuals, who occupy damaged houses, because of subsidence, 171 and this applies to repairs generally. It is the cost of repairing public property such as sewers, gas and water mains.

I may be excused for dealing specifically with the position in my own Division and would like to give the House one or two examples of what I mean from the Abertillery Urban District Council area. In eight years, from 1935 to 1943, the difference in the quantity of gas sent out and the amount accounted for amounted to the enormous figure of 160,000,000 cubic feet of gas lost, and that means a loss, expressed in money, of over £9,725; in the same period, the cost of repairs to mains and services was over £9,000. The cost of repairs in one case involved an expenditure, which fell on those people whose private properties had already been damaged, of no less than £350. In the case of new mains, varying from 2 inches to 7 inches, we have had to lay over 8,149 feet, and the total cost of repairs to mains, services, works and plant during those same eight years was over £25,000. This is an enormous burden to an area that has suffered for so many years from industrial depression followed by a long period of unemployment. The house repairs necessitated by subsidence have cost the owners many thousands of pounds, and many more thousands of pounds are required to meet the cost of repairs due to the damage caused by the working of coal underneath the property. In some instances that are known to me personally, it will involve an expenditure of over £100 to repair a single house. To mention that sum is sufficient evidence that it cannot be found by people who live in an area that has suffered for so many years from industrial depression.

In my part of the country we have a water board and a sewerage board whose administrative powers naturally extend beyond the limits of the Division I have the honour to represent, and I am informed that in one area the cost of replacing a length of sewer damaged by subsidence was £1,650. During a particular period the Board, for similar repairs, paid over £35,420. This is in addition to an expenditure from 1910 to 1923 of over £12,000. In the Abertillery district alone, the water board in a period of eight years has effected repairs to mains, etc., costing over £10,000. Here I want to say that I can speak only on behalf of my own people, but a recital of these facts may be unnecessary to those 172 who have studied the evidence submitted to the Royal Commission on Mining Subsidence and are similar to those known to my colleagues on this side of the House. They are also known to my hon. Friend who is going to reply, and they are or can be the property of the appropriate Departments of the Government.

I would like to refer to an observation made by one of my hon. Friends who wanted to help me when I put down the Question to the Minister, instead of which I am afraid that he rather hindered me. In his supplementary question he asked the Minister whether the right hon. and gallant Gentleman and his Department would take into account the very important fact that new industries would not come to those areas because of the fear of subsidence of new factories. That is doing the people who live in those areas a grave injustice, because there is not a single instance where owners of a new industry have refused to construct a factory or establish a new industry in my Division as the result of subsidence. The hon. Member who made the observation ought to have known that in most, if not all, the Welsh mining valleys, the houses are built on the side of the mountain, on a slope, and even if the houses had not been erected, it would have been impossible to construct a factory in such an area. I am anxious that the impression should not be created that it is impossible to bring new industries into these areas because of subsidence, and it is because of these facts that I think we are entitled to know what the Government propose to do in the matter, and what action can he expected for those who suffer.

§ The Joint Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Fuel and Power (Mr. Tom Smith)

Nobody will complain that my hon. Friend the Member for Abertillery (Mr. Daggar) has raised this matter or, indeed, at the manner in which he has dealt with it. As he truthfully said, I am no stranger to this matter of mining subsidence. As a matter of fact I think most hon. Members who represent mining constituencies know that it is fairly general. When my hon. Friend the Member for Abertillery put down his Question, in March, he was concerned not only with what consultations were taking place but with what kind of action was going to be taken by the Government. May I assure him, first, that so far as the 173 consultations are concerned, they have taken place with a number of other Ministries. It is only right they should, because when we were debating the Coal Mines Amendment Bill, I think, last July and we had the Amendment put down by the late Mr. David Adams, then Member for Consett and the hon. Member for Leigh (Mr. Tinker), we did say that this matter would have to be discussed thoroughly.

I should perhaps mention one or two of the Ministries that have been consulted, forgetting for the moment at least the question of past damage. There is, for example, the Ministry of Town and Country Planning. You cannot very well plan unless you take into account the extent and possibility of mining subsidence. The Ministry of Town and Country Planning have been consulted and the Board of Trade, also, are interested in this matter, as the location of industries comes within their purview. There are districts in this country, my own in particular, where we would have had some industries had it not been for the prevalence of mining subsidence. In consulting the other Ministries we have to keep in mind the fact that if a prospective builder knows the extent or possibility of mining subsidence, he can take precautions against it. Let me give an illustration about a factory which was erected in my area about two years ago. There, the prospective builders were advised that if they built the factory on a kind of concrete raft, or cradle, it would not only have stronger resistance but, in the event of subsidence taking place gradually, the factory would not tilt but would sink in a more or less uniform fashion. I want to assure my hon. Friend, therefore, that we were quite sincere in suggesting that we would consult other Ministries. These consultations are not yet complete.

What is the position to-day, as a result of the Coal Mines Act, 1930, which took over royalties, because it alters somewhat the future position? In the case of coal already in lease, the position is as it was before the passing of the Act. If there was a right to let down the surface without paying compensation for damage, that right continues. If there was such a right, subject to compensation for damage, the liability to pay compensation remains. It is the normal practice for a lessor to pass on such rights and liabili- 174 ties to his lessee. The Act provided that if the existing lease did not cover the life of the coal, existing rights and liabilities should continue for the extra period. In the case of coal unleased but already in separate ownership from the surface, the Coal Commission have the same rights and liabilities as the previous owner. Now we come to the future.

In the case of coal unleased and still in the same ownership as the surface the Commission acquired only the coal, and as the previous owner of both coal and surface could scarcely have any rights or liabilities against himself it was necessary to make some provision in this respect. The Act provides that the Commission have the right to let down the surface subject to payment of compensation or the execution of satisfactory repairs. There are certain special provisions dealing, for example, with public utility undertakings and the surface owner still has the right to go to the Railway and Canal Commission and ask for the grant of a right to support by saying that it is in the national interest and that his buildings are of greater importance than the coal.

There were laid down in the Schedule to the 1938 Act a lot of provisions with regard to the last of the positions that I have quoted, in which the Coal Commission, in granting a lease, when they have the right to say "Yes" or "No" with regard to withdrawing the right to support can do so, "provided they pay compensation in case of damage, or pay for repairs to the reasonable satisfaction of the person concerned." They can say to a prospective builder, "It is essential that you should build in a certain way and with certain materials as a precaution against mining subsidence," and if the prospective builder were to disregard the conditions laid down, he would forgo his right to compensation. A good deal of the discussion that has taken place over a number of years in the House, is in with regard to the past. There were on the Royal Commission which reported in 1927 three or four of our own colleagues—I think Vernon Hartshorn and a present Member for one of the Scottish Divisions—and they recommended that private owners or occupiers of property, of £40 annual rateable value or less, who had no right of support or compensation, should have the right to claim damages. I believe they made the county court the venue for redress. The Report is certainly 175 worth re-reading. We all know of men who have bought a house with their savings and lost it through subsidence with no compensation. Further, there are leases where the colliery owner repairs, and others where he does not. There is no uniformity.

Let us look at some of the difficulties with regard to this question of compensating people in respect of property of low rateable value. A Bill introduced in 1939 contained a provision for fulfilling the recommendations of the Royal Commission with regard to small owner occupiers and also with regard to damage sustained by local authorities. It is also true that the Royal Commission rejected the claim for compensation for damage to property owned by local authorities. The position with regard to the law on that is that there is a code which dates back nearly 100 years, limited in character, which gives to local authorities the right of notice of approach when coal is being worked within a given distance of their property. The local authority has powers to bargain with the colliery company for compensation for leaving the support in. That has usually been based on the actual cost to the local authority, because they have to compensate in a rather generous way and many of them cannot do it. It is also true with regard to other property owned by them that they had neither right of support nor of compensation, but the Bill contains that as well as compensation to the small owner-occupier.

What was the history of that Bill? It passed through the Second Reading, despite the non-committal attitude of the then Secretary for Mines. It went to a Committee and was completely mutilated. It became a skeleton with little meat on it by the time the Committee finished with it, because they took out references to everything except in respect of the 176 small owner-occupier. The Bill went to the other place as a very bare skeleton, but I do not know whether they killed it. It is not alive now, for it was more or less finished when the war broke out. That Bill was retrospective to damage done as far back as 1934, but the Royal Commission did not recommend that.

Here comes the difficulty. My hon. Friend the Member for Abertillery says in effect, "Now that the State own the coal the liability for damage done in the past, especially to the small people, should fall on the State." It is curious to reread this Report because the Royal Commission considered two or three alternatives as to who should bear the cost. One was a levy on every ton of coal produced, national in character, out of which this damage should be paid for. Another alternative was that there should be a levy in districts for the same purpose. The Commission rejected the suggestions, of a district pool and a national pool, and put forward an argument that if colliery owners had their liabilities restricted by having a common pool that might lead them not to pay the same attention to preventing subsidence as they would do if they had to bear the expense themselves. They then recommended that the cost of compensating the owner-occupier should fall on those who worked the coal. Some of the people who worked these coal seams, who extracted the coal, and who, there is no doubt, caused the damage, have gone out of existence. It is also true that individuals who owned the collieries are now dead—