MUNITIONS FACTORIES MOBILISED

Dominion, Volume 9, Issue 2651, 23 December 1915, Page 5

MUNITIONS FACTORIES MOBILISED

WONDERFUL ORGANISATION STIRRING 'SPEECH 'BY' 1 MINISTER OF MUNITIONS .•. ' By Telegraph—Press Association-Copyright tt a r !• • ,i rr . London, December 21. Mr. .Lloyd George, speaking in the House of Commons, made a statement regarding munitions during the sis months since Mr. Asquith invited him to take over the provision of munitions. He had beon instructed to increase the supplies, m order to lessen the losses in attacking perilous positions. Previously what we stinted in material we squandered in lives. The shortage of shell was. known to our troops and the enemy, but neither knew how really short wo were in some very essential particulars. Military Experts ami High Explosives. , Military' experts believed that the days of high explosives were numbered ©scept for and considered l that shrapnel was. the only weapon for hoid warfare. The British wore reluctant converts to the conclusion that a verv substantial proportion of high explosivos was essential to success in trench, warfare. The experts now believed that quite half of the high explosives was necessary, but came to tho conclusion too late to prevent a shortage of shells. Conspicious Success of Government Factories. 'At the beginning of the year the Ministry of Munitions erected buildines to supplement the works of private firms. The Ministry organised fortvl«?il ammunition committees in the most important engineering centres, and also put up national shell factories, which had been a conspicuous success not onlv in increasing the supply but in minimising labour difficulties, enabling tho Government to check prices. The result had been that last week the factories I 1 '®® 5T- S 111 « lgll c ®^ losive she,ls as all the arsenals in : the United Kingdom did in tli3 mouth of Ma)'. The] quantity of shell fired during the operations in September was enormous. lhe battle lasted for weeks, yet there was no shortage/of this ammunition, the result of four months' carefu husbanding. The whole was replaced in a month, and we will sooa be m a position to replace such a quantity in a ™£1 W ,•' , T le pOS^TOn i re Sardmg the medium guns and howitzers was thoroughly satisfactory. Up to mid-summer this year big guns had not been ordered on a large scale .Considerable reductions had bein effected in the prices of raw'materials; thenfihad been an aggregate saving of tboufc twontv millions by the Department securing control of % metal marl-et. • A Cood Margin a Wise Insurance.' 'Mr., Lloyd George told an astonished House that it was not until Mr Asquith visited tho trenches m June that the overwhelming importance of mac line guns was realised. One of the first things done was the multiplying iof the output of machine guns. A new factory to produce the smaller S had .been equipped, and two new factories were erected ,to turn out a Z type of machine gun, the result being that the delivery was increased fivefold. The output of riflos was vastly increased. Trench mortars were a new development, 6ut the output of grenades had been increased forty timos Tho t?o S natds I)0lm amrnUmtlon WaS r l ° ed by 40 Per CCnt- ' and ° tllers P ro P<>rThey wanted labour to man all the factories. Machines for making machine guns were idle for lack of men. If they could get skilled men where they were wanted, the problem of,:,the war would be solved. For the new factories tW wanted eightlv thousand skilled and three hundred' thousand unskilled workers. He had heard! talk ot over-ordering and over-production. Nothing could bo mora mischievous. They could talk ot over-ordering when they had ™ •much as the Germans. A good margin was a wise insurance: less than enouch ■was foolish extravagance. What we spared in money we spilled in blood. A Fine Piece of Hustling. In no war eVer . fought was the preponderance of machinery so completely established... The German successes were almost entirely duo to the mechanieil preponderance they had' achieved, At tho Beginning of the war wo had appointed a number of "hustlers" to visit the factories, find out what was wrong, set it right, and press forward tho contracts. The net result was an increase of tho deliveries oh old orders by 60 per cent; 'Two emergency factories for filling had been erected in six weeks—a fine piece of hustling . Mr. Thomas went, to America, and reported that Mr. Morgan had saved Britain millions by preventing the inflation of prices. He had' a remarkable photograph of the Loos battlefields showinu the barbed wire undestroyed, but only one machine-gun emplacement intact Everv soldier says there is only one way of doing ifr-4jy having enough ammunition to crush every enemy trench and every yard of entanglements. If the enemv wants to resist, he must do it in the open. < . * "Too Late!" The Mocking Speotro. In conclusion, Mr. Llovd George appealed, to employers and' workmen not to have "100 Later inscribed on the protals or tlie workshops "They are fatal words in this war. Too late in moving here too late in arriving there, too' late m coming to this decision, too late in sta'tine that en terpriso, too late in preparing. The footsteps of the Allies are dodged bv the mocking spectre of To> Late. Unless we quicken our movements" damnation will fall on the sacred cause for which so much gallant blood has flowed ' Victory depends upon the eirployors and the workers. Tho question is whether we aro going to drag tho war to an end in a year victoriously or to linger along tho blood-stained path for years." ° German and British Shell Output. Mr. Lloyd George also stated that the German daily output of shells in May was a quarter of a million. The British at that time were nrorfircintr own high explosives and 13,000 shrapnel snells. producing „oUU MILITARY EXPERTS AND MACHINE GUNS. London, December 21 The "Daily Telegraph's" Parliamentary correspondent, referring to tho neglecrt to supply machine guns (mentioned by Mr. Lloyd George), asks whv it, was not realised at the War Office till Jutl®. Why wjis It. Jfift »t. O (.lylflHii Prime Minister ta-wss the truth ugwi ths nwlito 1