ARMY AND NAVY

Greymouth Evening Star, 11 March 1933, Page 8

ARMY AND NAVY

BRITISH ESTIMATES INCREASED.

RUGBY, March 10.

Naval estimates show a net total for 1933, of £53,870.000 which exceeds Ihe net total of the previous year by £3,093,700. Of this increase £2.355,360 is required to make normal progress with the new construction. A large part, of the normal expenditure upon shipbuilding in 1932 had been deliberately retarded in the interests of economy and disarmament, into subsequent years, by the temporary expedient of deferring the order for the 1931 programme. The remainder of the increase provides for an automatic rise in 1933 in the total of noneffective votes, including a. provision, amounting to £295,367, for increases in retired pay, pensions, and superannuation allowances. The new construction programme provides for four cruisers, one leader, eight destroyers, three submarines, three sloops, one convoy, sloop, one coastal sloop, and small craft. The cruisers constitute the final instalment of the replacement due for completion by December, 1936, under the terms of the London Naval Treaty. The estimates are restricted by the exigencies of the financial situation, and do not fully provide for all the potential needs of the navy.

The First Lord of the Admiralty presenting the Navy estimates, said that oil fuel produced from British coal, was being tried in a number of ships. Fifteen capital ships and cruisers were now fitted with catapults for aircraft.

The Financial Secretary for the War Office, introducing the Army estimates in the Commons, said the economies effected in last year’s estimates, in view of the exceptional financial conditions were made with great misgiving. The estimates presented represented an increase of £1,462,000. Referring to the merchanisation of the Army, he said that experience justified the adoption of the light tractor, and one more field artillery brigade woijid be equipped with it. It has now been decided that light and medium tanks should be employed in combination and the tank battalions have been reorganised on that basis.

BOMBERS’ SAFETY.

LONDON, March 10.

An unsinkable Fairey Bomber designed by the Royal Air Force fleet air arm, was successfull demonstrated at Feltham. Special flotation bags are fitted inside the fusilage, the pilot merely pulls a string and a rubber dinghy emerges, the top wing being fully inflated. At the conclusion of the tests, a battleship ran over the plane, which remained afloat unharmed.

DISCIPLINE MAINTAINED.

LONDON, March 10.

The Commons, by 30 votes, read a third time the Visiting Forces British Commonwealth Bill.

Mr Boyd Merriman said the Bill would only apply to forces raised in the Dominions, and quartered in Britain, who of their own accord uphold the honour of the Dominions. The Bill was carried out of the deliberate wish of the Imperial Conference in 1930.