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Miners Welfare.
There is an old British adage which says, "Look after the
pennies and the pounds will take care of themselves", meaning
that thrift in small matters will bring great riches in the end.
The founders of the Miners Welfare Fund apparently had this in
mind, but they started their schemes not cn pennies but on
half-pennies.
The fund was instituted in 1920, when a half-penny levy was
laid on every ton of coal raised. In addition there was a levy
of a shilling in the pound on mining royalties
the difference
Last year the revenue of the organisation
amounted to £819,000, and its grant expenditure
being made up out of balances - to £1,264,000.
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Particular attention has been paid to the provision of
pit-head baths, and up to the end of last year baths for
400,000 persons at 313 collieries had already been provided.
The total expenditure on the installation of pit-head baths,
either completed or under construction, at the end of last year
was £5,453,000, and on the average 93 per cent. of the workmen
employed make use of them.
During the next five years an additional half-penny a ton will be levied on all coal raised, providing a further large sum for expenditure mainly on baths, but there are many other
fields in which the Miners Welfare Fund is active. Nearly
£5,620,000 has been spent on facilities for indoor and outdoor
recreation and cultural activities; about £3,570,000 has been
allocated to convalescent homes for miners, hospitals, ambulances services, nursing, and special medical treatment, and well equipped centres of education have been establised in almost all mining
districts, at a total cost of about £1,156,000.
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