THE SHIPPING CRISIS.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LVIII, Issue 17691, 28 January 1921, Page 5

THE SHIPPING CRISIS.

CAUSES OF DEPRESSION.

LORD INCHCAPE'S VIEWS. WAR WAGES IMPOSSIBLE. By Telegraph—Press Association—Copyright (Received 12.30 a.m.) A. and NZ. LONDON, Jan. 26. Lord Inchcape, chairman of the British India and P. and 0. Steam Navigation Companies, in a letter to the newspapers points out that ships are being laid up all over the world, ports are congested everywhere, and thousands of officers and seamen are unemployed, yet a commission is sitting in Brussels to consider the advisability of limiting employment to eight hours daily. Before the war the wages of stewards were £3 10s a month ; now they are £13 15s. This did not matter much during the war when ships were chartered by the Government and the wages charge was against the State. Now wages must be paid out of the earnings of vessels, and the earnings will not pay them. The thieving that goes on at sea and in the docks is beyond anything known to history. "As things are." he concludes, "we would be in pocket by discharging all our men and laying up our ship s in charge of a 70-year-old caretaker and a few aged charwomen. The end will come and we shall get back to a sound economic working basis, though the time may not be quite yet."

AUSTRALIAN DISPUTE.

OWNERS MAKE DEMANDS.

"JOB CONTROL" MUST END.

A. and N.Z. MELBOTTBNE, Jan. 27. The Steamship Owners* Federation held a meeting to-day to consider the an nouneement that the tiewarde are willing to return to work, and a resolution was carried to the effect that until assurances be given that the maritime unions will work uninterruptedly under the existing awards and agreements, and that the policy of " job control " will be discontinued, none of the 76 steamers now lying idle will be re-comniissioned.