BRITAIN’S NAVY.

Waikato Times, Volume 107, Issue 17972, 18 March 1930, Page 7

BRITAIN’S NAVY.

ESTIMATES SUBMITTED. SUBSTANTIAL REDUCTION SHOWN FIRST LORD’S ADDRESS. CURTAILMENT OF PROGRAMMES. (Official Wireless.) RUGBY, March 17. Introducing the navy estimates in the House of Commons, Right Hon. A. V. Alexander, First Lord of the Admiralty said they amounted to £51,739,000 as against £55,885,000 for last year, showing a reduction of £4,126,000.

Tile estimates were within £190,000 of the figure submitted for 1914, which were the last pre-war estimates, but, in order to get a true comparison with 1914, allowance must be made for the higher costs and prices to-day. Calculated on pre-war rates, the provisions covered by the present estimates should not have cost more than £31,000,000, or a reduction of 39 per cent. The provision this year, however, covered a much larger proportion of non-effective charges than in 1914. To-day ttie noneffective charges amounted to £8,500,000 compared with £3,000,000 in 1914; so if one compared the actual effective services of the navy, the present net cslimales were £43,000,000 compared with £48,500.000 in 1914. Reducing the present estimates to pre-war values, there was a reduction of no less than 56 per cent.

“ I beg the House to remember,” said Mr Alexander, that no other naval Power in the world has voluntarily made a reduction compared with pre-war.”

With regard to reduction in shipbuilding, Mr Alexander said : “It is with great satisfaction the Government have found in the general trend of world affairs and tile general outlook for peace, a justification for proceeding still further along the road already, to some extent, marked out by the last Government of slowing down the rates of our naval construction and giving proof of our sincerity in the cause of allround reductions in armaments. The reductions we have made in the last two annual programmes of the five years’ programme of the late have been made in the same spirit as actuated (he last Government in the reductions they themselves made in certain of their annual programmes, but I would say they have been made with greater courage and a stronger determination for the end in view and have been made accordingly very much more drastic. We are convinced that the provision we are now making is adequate. “ Our replacement programme must be related not to our present strength but to future needs. What those needs will be cannot be accurately forecast until the results of the London Conference have been ascertained and duly collated.” The Minister hoped that the feeling of pessimism regarding the conference so often expressed would prove to be unfounded, and he deprecated any discussion to-day of a kind which would not be of assistance in bringing the conference to a successful issue.

No provision was made for a construction programme for 1930, and the Government were holding over any decision as to what this should bo, not only for 1930 but in respect to the 1931 programme.

It had been thought best, in view of the proposals which the British delegation had made at the conference for the total abolition of the submarine, to suspend for the present the submarine part of that programme. The House need not view with alarm the prospect of a supplementary estimate to meet future needs in this respect. The provision made in 1929 for new construction of submarines amounted to £SO,OOO. and no greater figure than that would be asked in respect of 1930, unless he had to ask for the three submarines provisionally ed in 1929 programme. Should this necessity unfortunately arise, and he would not delude the House into thinking such contingency might be ignored, the supplementary grant might have to he increased _to more material size, but it would still represent a small fraction of the reduction of the estimates as a whole, and it would still mean that the ultimate saving on the 1929 construction programme would be no less than £050,000. Mr Alexander added that a very considerable slowing down of work on Singapore Base lias been found possible without in any way prejudicing the ultimate decision.

A final decision on the future development of the Base would be sought as soon as possible after the naval conference, but It would not bo taken until after consultation with the overseas Governments affected.

Mr Winston Churchill said the Conservatives did not assent to the present proposals and estimates of the Government. He asked why the reduction in cruiser strength was announced before the conference began instead of becoming part of the general process of disarmament. Whereas every other Power had stated its requirements at a maximum, Britain had begun by announcing an enormous reduction of armaments and then the conference proceeded to a basis of seeing how much more could he counted down. “There is grave danger,” said Mr Churchhill, “ that the conference may become a

process not of general naval disarmament but of disarming Great Britain, while other Powers become actually stronger.”

Air Churchill pointed out that before the war Britain had 1-10,000 seamen and marines, and after the war only 99,000, and she was now to reduce. liic number to 94,000. During Ihe same period the United Stales, the next strongest naval power, had increased its personnel from 67.000 in 1914 to 114,000 in the present year. In the face of such figures what became of the doctrine of parity ?