SURPLUS WAR MATERIAL

Dominion, Volume 13, Issue 77, 24 December 1919, Page 7

SURPLUS WAR MATERIAL

WILL TAKE YEARS TO SELL IT. Surplus Arniy material is lyjng'inmany parts of Great Britain, Fran*, Belgium, Egypt, Salonika, Palestine, and Mesopotamia (says the "Daily Mail").' Surplus Navy material is filling ports and liarbours. The total realisable value of this material was estimated by ft Disposals Board official at somewhere about £300,000,000. • . , ■ Public feeling is shown in angry letters to newspapers, members cf Pariiament, «io responsible head of Disposals, Lord Irverforth, and the Active head, Mr. F. G. Eellaway. Tho result of this criticism if Wng Mt. ft has already;!** in places to the dismissal of a few minor persons who havo not been doing their duty, a Disposals official stated. This official offered two reasons for the slow rate at which the material is being sold to people who can make use of it: A desire to got the best possible price for tho public, A fear lest certain trades should Dβ ruined bv a flood of Army material. He acknowledged thai at the present rate of disposal it would take years to realise the stocks. There is, for example, one set of buildings in" London covering several acres which contains in ono section thousands of maguctocs.lho new English magneto industry would 'bo ruined, it is suggested, it' these wore sold by auction and the spues H"™ UP t? 10 people who own the bsMms. As for moving the inaynetoes and tue "hundreds of thousands of pounds worth" of other stores, that would tako from seven to eight months and require endless transport. But while the ma Bnetoes are in store they arc eating up money in the form of rout and payment of clerks and storekeepers. So it is everywhere, and in many places tho sU«*s are not housed in warehouses, out .eft in the open to mt a d rot Travellers- on the Great .Western Railway crane cut of the windows oponem at ll.e sight of «ti.ck s v.pon etaeks of barrows, shovels, picks, and other material oxteiidiiss for miles. Going north \ similar sight of acre-, of epen ground closely packed with light enrta can be sen at Chilmll, near Nottingham In France and Belgium such sights are common wherever the British Army haa c ■ Wished depots.. In ono spot near Mon» too are hundreds of motor trans. I)O iva!.nwUHl Belgium have both made olVe s for the best of tho British salvage and the latter country has bought b r4s and railway material ftt iair prices; but the Americans spoiled the a-ket l>v nractically Blving away minso etol-os'and the War Odice is eUcfc ing to its price and shipping everything for whicH ttmt price caunot bo oblam.

Tho toW result appears to bo lh.it while Groi>t Britain is already loaded up with unroalisable stores, more stores aie n<riir in bv way of tho Bwhborougli tS«TiM, "and buildliiß* «M toW nwded which ought to be clenrod and SO h," csHnmtins Hio rcnlwnblc stores at overloaded inarkct still more stores.