DOMINION SHIP BUILDING.

Dominion, Volume 4, Issue 965, 4 November 1910, Page 4

DOMINION SHIP BUILDING.

OLD. INDUSTRY DYING OUT. (By Telegraph.-Special Correspondent.! Auckland, November 3. General dissatisfaction exists among lecal shipbuilders owing to the. lack of encouragement : given to the industry, and to the great disabilities under which, builders labour on account of the small size of the allotments leased to them by tho Harbour Board. Without exception, the prominent builders here consider theft the' industry is in a languishing condition. Instead of' progressing it gas gene back . during ' the ■ past few' years. One .'prominent'-builder informed a "Herald" . repreeentative yesterday that, about 20 or 30 years ago, it was no uncommon' sight to see over-100 men working in a yard, In those days Auckland shipbuilding firms . built up a reputation. that; extended beyond the Dominion. This, however, was bow a thing of the past, and nowadays Auckland firms had to refuse 1 large orders month after month as the precarious nature of the leases offer? «1 to them by the Harbour Board, an 4 the harassing conditions generally checked the expenditure of the capital necessary to increase shipbuilding plants to. copa with large orders. As far back as

iiO quite a large vessel, the Stirlingshire, was built at the Great Barrier and, about the same "time," two brige were, built in. Auckland—the Moa and the were, for a : number of years the qnly ! vessels trading between Auckland -ajKl "Sydney. From 1850 to .1860 a large number of vessels were built on the coast, and in-1861 a large vessel, tfie Novelty,, was built in Mechanic Bay to carry cargo .between Auckland and Sydney. This vessel afterwards traded between Sydney and London. During the next few years a large number of vessels were built in.Auckland for-Sydney people, and also for the Australian and the South Sea Islands trades, and now, after these splendid beginnings, the.-in. dustry -languishes.