SHIPPING TROUBLE.

Hokitika Guardian, 10 November 1925, Page 3

SHIPPING TROUBLE.

COST TO AUSTRALIA

ILLUMINATING FIGURKS

SYDNEY, November 20. Exactly what lias been tlie cost to Australia of the strike of the crews of British ships, and the losses incurred by the owners of British ships cannot of course he reckoned to the last shilling and pence. Competent eomputators, however, have been able to estimate the combined losses on an approximate, yet fairly accurate scale, and tbe result of tbeir calculations provides staggering and illuminating figures. Forty-four British ships have been affected by tbe strike in Australian ports, the aggregate tonnage of these vessels being 331,500. The cost of having these vessels held up has varied at between ■£3oo and £350 a day, and tbe loss up to the middle of this week, when the strike had lieen in existence 00 days, was about £730,000. -

The loss of freight to British ships lias been enormous. Take the case of wool alone. During August and September, 109,000 bales of wool were exported. Ordinarily, Japanese and other foreign ships take about onethird .of Australia’s wool exports, and deducting this usual percentage from the quantity exported while the strike lias been in progress, it will he seen that roughly 130.000 bales have been carried by foreign vessels which otherwise would have gone to British ships. '.Taking the average freight at .‘lds a bale, British owners have lost upwards of t-1200,000. Freight on other Australian produce has been similarly lost, to the calculated amount of £150,000. The story in figures is equally disastrous from the men’s point of view. About 1000 seamen, firemen, and other ratings have been affected, and the wages lost by them in consequence amounts to at least £-10.000. That loss can never be recovered.

LOCAL TRADE HAMPERED.. Local trade is being hampered and restricted by reason of tbe non-arrival of many lines of the present season’s goods. Retail traders are already complaining that busines is slackening, and the direct loss is assuming large proportions. Four importers in Sydney alone have stated thut they have goods valued at £134,000 hung up, and a ‘conservative valuation of all goods so affected in Australian ports is £3,000,000. At least 25 per cent of these goods would have been sold to the public by now, so on the inward trade the direct loss approaches £1,000,000. From tbe point of view of the primary producer, tbe position is still less cheery. -Meat and dairy produce have been most affected. As Australia depends largely on British ships for refrigerating space, tbe loss because this cannot be shipped is considerable. A rough estimate of tbe value of export beef held up by the strike is £1,000,000, an amount bv which Australian trade is to-day the poorer. The strike occurred in the shipping season for eggs, extending from August to October, and it has been responsible for tbe non-shipment of between (50,000 and 70,000 cases—about 2,000,000 dozen. It is claimed that there is no local market value for these eggs, for -they arc the surplus of local requirements, and consequently there has been a direct loss of £IOO,OOO on eggs alone. Other primary products are also affected, but the greatest fear is that markets abroad will be seriously injured by tbe lack of continuity and regularity in supplies from this country. That loss is inestimable, but‘ it is none .the less real, as New South Wales knows from her loss of foreign coal markets by continual strikes on tbe northern coalfields three or four years ago. And those coal markets have never been recaptured.