Mr. Jenkinsasked the Secretary for Mines whether he can state the rate of accidents, fatal and serious, respectively, per 1,000 persons employed in the coal mines of Great Britain and France for the years 1935 to the most recent date?
Captain Crook shankThe methods adopted in Great Britain and France for determining the numbers of persons employed differ materially and do not provide a reliable basis for the comparison of the accident rate of the two countries. I am, therefore, giving the hon. Member the fatal accident rates per 100,000 man-shifts worked. Even these, however, are not strictly comparable, because in Great Britain all accidents which result in death within a year and a day of the accident are included, whereas in France it is usual to comprise in the annual totals only those accidents which involve death within the calendar year in which the accident occurred. The figures are as follows:
— Great Britain. (Mines under the Coal Mines Act.) France.(Coal and Lignite Mines). 1935 … 0.43 0.33 1936 … 0.39 0.29 1937 … 0.40 0.26 (provisional) 1938 … 0.41 Not available (provisional) As regards non-fatal accidents, the differing bases for the collection of statistics in the two countries do not provide comparable figures.