Fateful Conference Likely on Saturday

Miners and Operators Meet at End of Ten-Day Truce to Negotiate Agreement

With the industrial security of the Coalfields hanging on the success of their deliberation, coal operators and miners will probably meet Saturday to negotiate a permanent agreement on wages and working conditions.
Under the terms of the peace pact signed by owners and employees on Oct. 5, the men were to return to work pending the outcome of a conference which was to be held in 10 days. Harry Hesketh, secretary of the miners' executive, yesterday notified the operators that Saturday would be a day suitable to the men for the conference. Owing to the absence in Winnipeg of C. C. Morfit, president of the Saskatchewan Coal Opertors' Association, he had not received a reply today. It is altogether likely that the meeting will be held Saturday.

Varied Speculation Speculation as to its outcome is varied. The miners have prepared a wage and working condition schedule for the basis of negotiations, and remain firm in their avowal not to continue work "under the old conditions." THe operators, on the other hand, will be handicapped in meeting the demands of the men by the limits of increasingly keen market competition. Whether or not a satisfactory agreement will be struck meanwhile occupies the attention of all walks of life in the community, and the outcome of the fatelful conference will be awaited with deep anxiety. One thing is certain, however. Both operators and employees will attend in a spirit of co-operation that would not likely have characterized such a meeting prior to the 30 day strike and the launching of the Royal Commission invesigation. Lessons have been learned on both sides.

Granted Bail David Rowsen and Isadore Minster, of Winnipeg, two of the men who were arrested following the riot on Sept. 29, have their bonds approved when they appeared before His Honor Judge J. W. Hannon in district court at Regina Wednesday afternoon.
William Stokes, of North Regina, was one of the bondmen for each of the men in the sum of $1,500.
Each of the two men was granted bail in his own recognizance of $3,000, together with a surety of a like amount when they appeared in district court Tuesday afternoon.
A third man, Tony Stankevich, who has just been released from hospital, also came up for bail Wednesday afternoon. Judge Hannon, however, adjourned the hearing of his application until the depositions should arrive from Estevan.
With the exception of Stankevich, all the arrested miners have been granted bail, and now await the hearing of the charges against them in the king's bench court of Estevan on March 3.