FULFILLING HER CONTRACTS

Hawera Star, Volume LII, 19 November 1932, Page 12

FULFILLING HER CONTRACTS

GREAT BRITAIN AT WORK. SHIPS AND VALUABLE MACHINERY. . There is evidence on every hand that Great Britain, despite the world trade i upheaval, is hard at work securing and j filling orders for overseas. Contract.-: running into hundreds of millions ol I pounds are being carried out by Bril ish firms in almost every country 01 the world. Contracts for hundreds of thousand: of pounds arc being fulfilled on electricity extensions all over Great Britain. One-third of the world’s shipping tonnage sails under the Union Jack. In spite of the world slump in trade Great Britain has paid for all her imports without drawing on capital. Last year Great Britain sold ships and machinery to the world worth more than £100.00,0110. British engineers are now building bridges all over the world costing £20,000,000. The Sydney Harbour Bridge, costing'' £7.000.000, the largest single arch bridge in the world, was built by : British firm. For 10 years China has been buying railway material from Belgium. She has now placed contracts with British firms worth £3,500,000. South Africa has ordered iron nnc! steel worth £2,500,000. Greece has ordered plant worth £500,000 for the conversion of lignite into charcoal. 'flic* Portuguese Government recently signed a contract with Vickers’ for warship- armament worth approximately £BOO,OOO. Four Portuguese destroyers are being built on the Clyde. Poland is spending approximate!' £600,00-0- on British material for the extension of her. telephone system. Hungary has ordered material for railway electrification worth £600.000.

! Last- year airplanes and aircraft' parts were sold abroad worth £2,099,- 1 COG. < A contract for airplanes for Argon- | tina has been placed in Great Britain worth £IOO,OOO. Belgium has ordered 55 fast fighting machines for its army. A £2,000,000 contract for raising the Assuan dam has been given to a British firm. British engineers are carrying out an extension on a harbour in Cyprus costing £200,000. Guns costing £BO,OOO are being made for the Spanish Government at Elswick. Hundreds of locomotives and thousands of locomotive and carriage wheels are being produced for railways in India, South America, China, Egypt and South Africa. South Wales is building the largest pressed-steel tank in the world for a .Punjab water scheme. A thousand tons o-f British machinery have been ordered for Pittsburg (Pennsylvania), the heart of the American steel-producing industry. The Great Western Railway is engaged on a development scheme costing £8,500,000. The total amount of payments to the United States of America on account of British war debts, to date, is -£326,030,000. The total amount i ceived by Great Britain on account of Allied war debts is £71,000,000. Payments by Great Britain have exceeded payments to Great Britain by the enormous sum of £225,000,000. Thus it will be seen that Great Britain is not only out after business, but, what is stilL more is getting it. During these difficult times one may, with sympathy and admiration, think of Great Britain as having fully justified the following magnificent tribute which was paid to her by Emerson f during the dark days of tiie Crimean War. Emerson wrote: “I see her, not dispirted nor weak, but remembering that she has seen dark days before; indeed, with a kind of instinct, that she sees a little better in a cloudy clay, and that in storm of battle and calamity, she has a secret vigour and j a pulse like cannon. I see her in her I old age, not decrepit, but young and' still daring to believe in her- power of endurance and expansion. Seeing this, I say, All Hail Mother of Nations. Mother of Heroes, with strength still equal to the time; still wise to entertain and swift to execute the policy/ which the mind and heart of mankind j requires in the present hour, and thus, ] only hospitable to the foreigner, and 1 truly a home to the thoughtful and ( generous who are born in the soil. So,: be it! So let it bo!” <