NEW SHIPPING WAR

Poverty Bay Herald, Volume LIV, Issue 16838, 29 December 1928, Page 5

NEW SHIPPING WAR

AMERICA AND BRITAIN THE HAVANA TRADE (Elec. Tel. Copyright—United Press Assn.> Australian and N.Z. Press Association (Received December 29, 11 a.m.) NEW YORK, Dee. 28. What is regarded in some quarters as tantamount to a shipping war between Britain and the. United States for the South American trade took a more serious turn to-day with the publication by the Cunard Line of a statement giving a hint of possible court action against tho linited States Shipping Hoard. The statement, was in the form of a letter to Mr. T. F. O'Connor, chairman of the Shipping Hoard, from Mr. Robert Blake, associate director of the Cunard Line, and charged the board with a violation of the United States Federal Statute. The Cunard Line resented the board's action, in placing the steamship President Roosevelt at the disposal of the Ward Lines after the Cunard Co. had announced that the Cunarder Caronia would be used for the Havana service. The Caronia started her initial voyage on the new run with a full passenger list on December 27. The President Roosevelt will start her first Havana trip on January 5. which coincides with the date of the Caronia's' second voyage. Mr.- O'Connor had stated that the board was merelv following the customary polity of aiding American merchant marine companies, but the Cunard statement, charged the board with a violation of section 14 of the Shipping Act, 1920, which bars the use of a "fighting ship," which it defines as follows: "The term fighting ship in this Act means a vessel used in a particular trade by a carrier or group of carriers for the purpose of excluding, preventing, or reducing competition by driving another carrier out of the said trade." The statement concludes : "Our proper course in such circumstances as now confront us would naturally he to refer the nmtte" in vnur board, but as the ship involved is the board's vessel, and is put into the trade on the terms above described by the board, we mav find it necessarv. if we are damaged to any appreciable extoiil, to appeal to the courts for relief."