HOW THE SHIPPING COMBINES

Taranaki Daily News, 1 June 1920, Page 4

HOW THE SHIPPING COMBINES

FORCE LIP THE COST OP LIVJNU. (By Sir Chiozza Money.) Think of ships which cost £600,000 earning .a,400,000 per annum! What! ought to :be done now is to requisition the whole off the British mercantile marine at Blue Book rates and devote the great consequent profit to the substantial reduction of the Cost of Living. "When I left the Government in November, 191,5, as a protest against the decision to resign the economic direction of the nation to the profiteers, and to sell out the national ships and factories' to private capitalists, I pointed out, inter alia, that the nation it'on Id have to pay heavily for being handed over to the vested interests. WE PAY HEAVILY. "The price has sin(j[j been paid in much more than money. We have not had the imports that we might 'have had if the direction of ships and imports had remained <in public hands. If we consider the monetary loss alone, however, the results are sufficiently startling. Indeed, the case is so extraordinary that it is difficult to tell the plain truth about it "without being suspected of exaggeration. In November, I<US. the whole of the British .mercantile marine was under requisition, and earning its owners the Blue Book, or arbitration, rates of hire, as raised in PUS to a level which gave a vejy fair margin of profit. Now only one-sixth to one-seventh of the ships are under requisition. It follows that the greater part of the British mercantile marine is earning for its owners the exorbitant rates of freight which it is possible to demand in a short market. HOW VALU US HAVE GROWN. ''The following statement will show how the value has grown of an ordinary cargo steamer ibuilt in l!) 1 4: Value of a Tramp Steamer Built in IMI4. (Per ton deadweight.) •'uly. 1014 £ fi July, 1910 ia ■September. 1010 24 ■May,. J!) 18 25 Now :m

"Let us see what this means in the case of a ship of 7000 tons deadweight. How a Tramp Steamer of 7.000 Ton* Deadweight has (down in Value. July, 11)14 '.....£42,000 December. 1!)1!) ...... 210,000 Increase in value .... £IOB,OOO Increase per cent. 400 ''Lest it be thought by the uninitiated that I am giving a, fanciful case, let me give the accountants' valuation of ships taken over by the Western Counties' Shipping 'Company, Ltd., a company just offered l for public subscription. Here is a fleet of cargo steamers, the total valuation of which is now given as £2,400,000. .Lhe total number of tons (deadweight) is only 1013,000. .If all these ships had been built in 1914 they would have cost,' as nearly as .possible, £OOO,OOO. But, it will bo .seen, many of them date long before 1914. For example, the Jnchmoor was fouilt in 1000, so that if the war had not occurred she would have suffered heavy depreciation. The present inflated valuation, if; will be seen, is £115,000 for a ■ship of only 5,800 tons, built 19 years ago! HOW .-FREIGHTS HAVE RISEN. "A tramp steamer in 1914, before the war began, could earn about 4s per ton per month on time charter. This com,pany state that the ships are earning from 20s to 27s (id per ton per month, or from five times to seven times the earnings of 1914. Consider the earnings of a single ship. The old lnchmoor, a ship of under 0,000 tons, which cost about £36,000 19 years ago, and which now, through age, is worth intrinsically much less •than when it was built, can earn about £90,000 in a siugk? year, reckoning the hire at 25s per ton per anonth. Or, if we take the above list of 17 ships, the actual gross revenue they earn, we are told, is now at the rate of £1,430,560 pei"annum. Think of ships which cost £600,000 earning £1,400,000 per annum ! Thus the British people, who paid to the shipowners during the war their capital over and over again, are continuing the process in peace, and appear to be quite content to go oil dofcg it even while we are assured that we have not the money as a nation to build electrical power stations or houses for the people. The madness of it all is beyond expression. The gross earnings of the British mercantile marine' this year will approach £400,000,000! OH, TOR ANOTHER "DIZZY." While turning down the nationalisation proposal, the War Cabinet did, however, order the complete requisitioning of shipping, and that kived the country an enormous sum of money, as Mr. Lloyd George has confessed. The reversal of the policy of requisitioning at the end of last year cost the country an enormous sum, as the Prime Minister has now confessed. Lord Inclicape, at the recent meeting of the P. and O. shareholders, did not conceal his delight at the success with which he had killed shipping nationalisation by buying out the nation's ships. I grant Lord' Inclicape that he had a great triumph."