"SERIOUS BEYOND EXPRESSION"

Evening Post, Volume CI, Issue 18, 21 January 1921, Page 3

"SERIOUS BEYOND EXPRESSION"

Files i recently i. to > hand comment interestingly on tho state of shipping in the United Kingdom at 1 present, ana of the business of ship ' owning . generally. Sir Walter Runciman, of the 'firm of Walter Runciman and Co., shipowners. head of the well-known "Mooi:" Line of veseels, in an article in The Syren gives BOtuo facts which are of singular interest to the publio in general, and shipowners in particular.' He states that whatever, may have been the case some time ago— when perhaps even a few tyros-of the "g;et-rich-quick" variety made money— .shippwhing is not quite the golden occupation: that some people fondly imagine. To-day, he says, there »re largo .numbers of boats ; lying idle in or out of dock while shipowners ' are searching for cargoes, and in many case* searching- in vain. An equally serious factor in the present situation is tbo way in which, shir* are held up in port, owing to congestion. It will, be says, probably com© as a jhock ta most people to learn that because of thio, although tho amount of merchant tonnage in the world very greatly exceeds the tonnage available before the war, the efficiency of the British merchant fleet is nearly 30 per cent. less. That means that it is doing only a little more than twothirds of the work.it did in the year precedingl the outbreak of the vrar^ • No wonder the Select Committee on National Expenditure Bhould say what those connected with shipping havo been sayingfor a considerable time—that "the' situation' is serious beyond expression." . He cites as other causes of the present state of affairs the eight-hour day and the less work done in the eight hours, and'rightly observes that this and tho lock of coal and docks congestion affect the whole community. Many ships leaving- British ports' are sailing- out empty, and the whole cost of the voyage and the profits have to be earned on the homeward passage. To anyone who haa a knowledge of the conditions which obtain in theshipping industry thero is, of, course, nothing new in these observations, but the publio is so woefully ignorant of such matters that it is in the interest* of the industry that some effort should be made to enlighten them. . • .