OBSOLETE SHIPS

Rotorua Morning Post, Volume 1, Issue 8, 1 September 1931, Page 4

OBSOLETE SHIPS

-FOREIGN SALE WRONG An aspect of the prevailing. economic depression as it ^ffects the shipping industry, was referred to at the annual giathering of Wellington master marinei's by 'Captain W. Stuart (of the Marine Department), who criticise.d t'he practice of selling ohsolete tonnage to foreign buyers during temporary slackness in trade. , Traversing the principal features of British shipping during the past 12 months, Captain Stuart said that two ahd a-half million tons of shipping were now lying idle, and 50,000 British seamen were unemploysd and practically dependent upon State relief. "We have got to iace this appalling fact," he said, " and we, as the New Zealand master mariners, have also to ask what is the cause and what is the remedy. , .• u Firstly, we Huve tlie guestion of ohsolete tonnage. Shipping companies to-day are prone to think that the fact that they got rid of a dozen or ,.more of their ships to foreign buyers, more particularly Eastern buyers, is good business. I say it is not good business; it is a mistake. What do. we flnd? They say that by getting rid of a dozen 1 old crocks 1 they can get two or three new ships. They forget that the Eastern buyers run those ships with c'heap labour, and run them against their forrner owners. " This policy is all wrong. We want our fleets kept intact during this economlc depression, and at the ^nd pf it not flnd them running with foreign or Eastern crews." s

Some BrlghV Spots. , Captain Stuart said that there were one or two bright spots in the past year's shipping, which proved that Britain still took flrst place in the mercantile marine world. There was the launching of the luxury liner Empress of Britain, which was second to none in naval arc-hitecture, and was Great Britain's answer to foreign naval architects. Another great feature was tlie building of the giant new Cunarder, Princess Elizabeth. Germany, with her mercantile marine reduced practically to nothing at the close of the war, had brought it up to about four-flfths of its pre-war strength. "She threw down a challenge to us by taking. the ' Blue .Rihand ' of the Atlaritic,". said Gaptaixi Stuart, "and Sir Percy Bates said the company would not he true to its ' traditions if it did not accept the challenge.' His company is building a liner of 70,000 tons,. costing £6,000,000, in an attempt to regain the 1 Blue Riband,' and I think every one of us should take our hats off to the Cunard Company."