NOTES AND COMMENTS

New Zealand Herald, Volume LV, Issue 16816, 5 April 1918, Page 4

NOTES AND COMMENTS

SUSTAINING THE GERMANS. The following' statement was circulated by the wireless stations of the Gorman Government early in .February:--" ing the whole of January the strikes in England have led to numerous riots and scenes in the streets. Hardly a day passed during this month without the crowd coming into conflict with the police in English towns. Concerning one of these riots, which took place in London on January 17, and which is typical of the state of affairs in England, our Amsterdam correspondent gives tho following details:—On January 17, at 3 p.m., there was a conflict between the police and the crowd, in which tho police had the worst of it, and were put to flight. Then a detachment of Scotch recruits who were in barracks at Shopcr Bush (Shepherd's Bush?) were summoned to their assistance. Whon they reached Oxford Street, where the principal fighting between the crowd and the police took place, and the soldiers were ordered to fire, the majority of them refused, and about eighty men were arrested and taken to the prison of Old Bailey. At Selfridge's great shop in Oxford Street all the windows were broken in tho riot. In the evening there were other tumults near Threadneedle Street." " After all." says the London Times, in commenting on tho report, "the fabrication and the issue of a fiction so grotesque serve a useful purpose. They give a measure of German mendacity and of the straits to which the German authorities must be reduced for sustaining public opinion. Only dire ■ necessity at home could lead them to put about lies so gross and palpable as these."

NEW BRITISH TONNAGE. Reviewing the position of shipbuilding in Britain, the annual financial and commercial review of tho London Times says the past year should, perhaps, be judged rather as one of preparation for the shipbuilding needs of a long war than by the actual tonnage launched. The want of co-ordination of effort in the early months of the year caused a considerable reduction in the tonnage which might have been launched had the policy now initiated been put in operation at an earlier period. It was too often the case that when the necessary supplies of labour were available there was a shortage of shipbuilding material, and another cause of delay arose from the fact that hulls were completed before the machinery was ready. Immediate progress was also hampered by the preparatory measures for a programme of standardised construction. The establishment of national yards in South Wales has been viewed as premature and unnecessary, being regarded as a threat to that private enterprise which has won for the United Kingdom the premier place in the industry, while even as a war expedient the consequent diversion of labour : and materials was looked upon as a mis- j take. The reply to these objections is that existing yards will,not be robbed either of labour or materials for the State yards, and it is understood that measures are to be taken to ensure the fullest utilisation of the existing shipbuilding facilities before giving out. work, to the national establishments. The steps which have been taken by the Government are, however, designed to provide for the possible needs of a very protracted war, and it may well be that before the end these national yards, as well as an augmented private shipbuilding industry, may be necessary to cope with the need for tonnage. It is generally agreed that although the preparations for .a programme of standardised shipbuilding may for the moment have retarded progress; 1 it is destined in the long run to have the effect of expediting production, and unless the anticipations now entertained are grossly falsified the shipbuilding output for the current year should establish new "record" figures. Although only a disappointingly small number of the standard vessels have been completed, this arises from the fact that it was necessary to clear the building clips of a large number of vessels already under construction. There are now a considerable number of the standard vessels approaching completion. It is, of course, a material advantage that the machinery equipment of the ships now under construction, as well as the hulls, has been standardised, as this will serve to prevent a repetition of the delays which formerly hampered the delivery of new tonnage.