UNIONISTS WANT OLD SHIPS SCRAPPED INSTEAD OF SOLD

Grey River Argus, 24 March 1949, Page 8

UNIONISTS WANT OLD SHIPS SCRAPPED INSTEAD OF SOLD

[From a Reuter Correspondent in London]

Mr D. S. Tennant, General Secretary of Britain’s Navigators’ and Engineer Officers’ Union, suggested in the Merchant Navy Journal that Britain’s old ships should provide scrap for the iron and steel industry instead of being sold for operation under foreign flags. “Surely it would he better to forgo the immediate hard currency proceeds of these sales rather than suffer the competition of these ships,” Mr Tennant stated. Since 1945 Britain has transferred 100,000 tons of obsolete ships to the Panamanian flag, said Mr Tennant. “Under the ships and aircraft transfer restriction Act of 1939, the Government now has the power to prevent the bitter mistakes of the nineteen thirties being repeated, hut no rule seems to govern the Ministry of Transport’s sanction of shipping sales, the solution is to subsidise rhe price of scrap.” ‘