NOTES AND COMMENTS.

Press, Volume LIV, Issue 16161, 15 March 1918, Page 8

NOTES AND COMMENTS.

THE SHIPPING SHORTAGE. Not, apparently, before the reform/in methods was considerably overdue, the Admiralty have reorganised the shipbuilding department. * Recent cables { have indicated, only too plainly, that all has not been going well with the British shipbuilding industry, which is nowadays of such vast importance to the nation and the Empire. Mr G. N. Barnes, the Labour member of the War Cabinet, was reported as making an urgent appeal to tho shipyard workers "to put their .backs into their wprk," bccause in January loss than half the estimated number of ships had been turned out, while in February the position ' -jvas. not improvejl. His statements were supported in the House of Commons by Mr Bonar Law, who said that the output of ships in the first two months of tho year had been vory disappointing, largely on account of labour troubles. The First Lord of the 'Admiralty subsequently issued a serious warniDg, that unless there was a speedy improvement the point at which production would balanco tho losses would be dangerously postponed —in other words, the balance against us would increase to & point at which tho nation s food supply would be furthor restricted. In January tho output of new shipping from British yards was only 58,000 tons. Xn the same month 49 British steamers of more than 1600 tons esfch were sunk by submarines. Tho new tonnage was therefore probably equal to only a fraction of tho month's losses. ' A BUIIiDING BOOM. This state of affairs was the more unfortunate because it followed a period of retnwkable activity in the shipyards in the closing months of last" year- Speaking in the

House of Commons on December 1 :Jth, Sir Eric Gcddcs said that 1013 was the record vear for shipbuiiuin«r of all kinds that Great Britain had ever known, the equivalent ol 2 280,000 gross tons being launched. This was made up of 1.920,000 tons ot merchant shipping and the equivalent of 362,000 gross tons of war vessels, a war vessel ton of displacement being regarded as equal in labour and steel to° two gross tons of merchant shipping. "Assuming that the output ior December is as good. as that for November," said Sir Eric, 'the actual tonnage of war vessels and merchant ships combined which we finished in 1917 will equal the output for the record year 1913. Rut," ho continued, "we "have been accelerating the shipbuilding during the latter months of the year, and for those months the figures are better. The output of all classes of ships at the rate of the last two months was 18 per cent, higher than the rate of output for 1913.' had been accomplished in spite of the groat demands upon the man-power of the country that had arisen from raising a great army and the effort to provide munitions for it. In addition they were planning for a merchant shipbuilding programme and for an output of war vessels each infinitely greater than anything the country had ever done in pre-war days.

"TO THE SHIPYARDS/' "But." eoncludcd the First Lord, "I must have ships and more ships and still more ships; and now I want the men to build them. Our plans arc laid; \vc have now got the steel, and we now want tho men. The Ministry of National Service is calling loudly and insistently for the men ior shipbuilding. I did not make this appeal for inen. before because we were short of shipbuilding steel, and in other wavs not ready for an increase of man-power; but now my message to men and women not engaged on direct war work or in tho fighting forces of the Crown is 'To the shipyards,' and I know I shall not call in vain."

The First Lord's statement and appeal were received with loud cheers, but there was some criticism of the Government's scheme of national shipyards on the Severn, which he had explained at some length. _ The idea, itwas said, was started without any of the distinguished shipbuilders in the' service of tho Admiralty ever being consulted, and doubt was expressed whether the national yards would produce better ships than the existing shipyards. It was alleged that at a time when the Government were asking for men for new shipbuilding yards the existing private yards were producing much less than they could produco because they were short of men and material.

It is, of course, impossible to say to what degree these criticisms were justified. But one gathers from Mr McNamara's speech in tho House of Commons, reported in to-day's cables, that there 'is strong feeling against tho national' shipyards, and that not enough usse has been made of the existing facilities for building ships. And it is a fact that the keel of the first vessel to be built in the national yards was not to bo laid down until the early part of this year.

WHAT AMERICA IS DOING. Mr Barnes, in the appeal to which we have referred above, said that the situation was very serious, "because iu the matter of shipbuilding America is failing us," while Sir Eric Geddes said that Britain must rely on her own resource?, becatise "some considerable time must elapse before tho desired American output materialised." As a matter of fact, in spite of all that wvas said and written m the United States as soon as war was declared with Germany, as to what America was going to do in tho way of providing ships, and in spite of the definite promises that wero made m the same connexion, America has not, up to the present, done very much. She has done, indeed, a great deal less than might have been, expected. Much of the "blame for this rests with -the original Shipping Board, who wasted time in squabbling over details when they should have been getting on with the work, and there is every hope that in the hands of Mr E. N. Hurley, the present chairman of the Board, the work will b© pushed on with all possible vigour. Hb is at least not afraid of responsibility, for he declared to a committee of the Senate a few weeks ago that if the programme Mas not carried through, it would be nobody's fault but his own. Whether America •will be able now, after all the delay that has occurred, to carry out her promise to supply six million tons of shipping to the Allied cause this year, has to be seen, but there is much leeway to be made up before such a feat can be performed. (

SLOW PROGRESS. In the meantime, as the result of tho examination of Mr Hurley and another member of the Shipping Board by the Senate Committee referred to, a number of facts came to light. It was admitted that only one ship had been begun and finished for the Government's merchant fleet since the formation of tho Shipping Board. Considerable delay had been caused by tho alteration of the plans and specifications for the Government wooden ships, these alterations being made while tho vessels were beinn: 'built. Seventyfour new shipyards had been built to

meet the emergency, of which fortytwo were planned "where there was not so much as a, homestead shack,". necessitating the erection of townships ''or the accommodation of the workers. Shortage of labour, railway trucks, and materials were all mentioned as causes for the delay that has occurred; all, since Mr Hurley took charge, have been overcome. But America has not, in spito of her experiences in tho past vear got over the habit of boasting. \Vo arc told that the wooden ship programme will result in 100 ships of 3000 tons each, a total of 350,000 being completed by April Ist, and that by that time there will have been completed not less than one million tons of steol ships, including those commandeered on the stocks. In view or the tremendous losses in the world s tonnage caused by the submarines, one can only hope that this is not too sanguine a prediction.