SHIPBUILDING BOOM

Poverty Bay Herald, Volume LV, Issue 16869, 5 February 1929, Page 10

SHIPBUILDING BOOM

STARTS IN BRITAIN BUSY WINTER PROMISED LONDON, December 15. The British shipbuilding industry, f«:>r ,-n luiit; depressed, litis in recent weeks shown Hfijnn of coming to life. The Ahipvavtls "ii tin; Clyde, Mersey and Tyne are now looking forward to tin active winter.

.;I he Clyde shipyards alone have contracts for 30 vessels aggregating muro than 150,000 lons dead weight. As (hero are always so orders which are never made public, these figures are really an understatement.

0/ UiC 30 vessels admiltedK contract ed for, only one is a hig liner ■ tin; 40.000-tou Canadian Pacific Empress or Britain. The others are mostly highclass tramp steamers for general cargo trade, two are Indian passenger and cargo boats and one—it largo cargo vessel—will he motor-driven. Not, all the new contracts come from Great Britain or the Dominions. One shipyard manager, tired of his idlw plant, ' went to America this uittuniu and returned with a pocket, full of orders.

At least a, score of the ships will be used for transporting the unprecedented -rain harvest from Canada. Tho Moss Line, Blue Funnel Line. Lamport and Holt Line and others are having vessels built in England during the coming winter.

One Blue Star li ' for the South American trade will be constructed on Tvncside and will, it is estimated, cost .0500,000. Norway, which is swiftly driving British whalers from the Antarctic, has ordered seven whaling ships built here, including one giant of 20,000 ions. At West Hartlepool 20 ships will slide down the ways some time early in the spring.

In Sunderland 20 ships., aggregating 168.000 tons, have been contracted for. Tlie natural inference from these con ditions is that British shipbuilding is in for its old-time prosperity. But caution? shipping men are not entirely pleased by these new Orders. They arc afraid speculation in shipbuilding will set in with high, wages and high prices for materials* demanded before there is any counter-balancing increase in profits.