MERCHANT NAVY

Wairarapa Times-Age, 3 February 1940, Page 5

MERCHANT NAVY

WAR LOSSES MORE THAN

BALANCED

ADMIRALTY’S NEW BUILDING PLANS. ADDITIONS TO PROGRAMME. (British Official Wireless.) RUGBY, February 1. It is understood that the merchantmen to be built under the arrangement whereby the Admiralty becomes responsible for merchant shipbuilding and repairs will be of five or six different types, allocated to the yards most suited for their construction. There will be increased activity in the shipbuilding yards, which at present are exceptionally busy.

The “Manchester Guardian” in its annual business review recalls that “even before the outbreak of war the course of events had decreed that 1939 would be an outstanding year in the records of British shipbuilding.” As a result of the Government provision of an operating subsidy for tramp shipping and cargo liners definite placings by mid-July, coupled with preliminary notifications, totalled over a million pounds. Moreover, on July 1 Naval vessels of a total of 690,000 tons to cost £150,000,000 were in hand in private yards, in addition to some 22,000 tons in the Royal dockyards. At the end of July additions were announced to the 1939 programme, 180 vessels being involved, about half of these being trawlers, to be completed for anti-submarine and mine-sweeping work, and a few days later orders fo'i 52 new vessels were announced.

Thus, compared with 1914, the work on which the shipyards were engaged at the end of August was immeasurably more appropriate to war purposes than 25 years ago. The mercantile tonnage ocmpleted since the outbreak of war and the tonnage put into the water virtually balanced the loss the merchant navy suffered from submarines and mines. When account is taken of the tonnage obtained by transfer from foreign firms and prizes taken from the enemy, there is actually a credit balance in favour of the merchant navy, compared with the position at the end of August.