1936-02-05 — Page 18

THE HONGKONG TELEGRAPH, WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 5, 1936.

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The

Hongkong Telegraph.

WEDNESDAY, F. 5, 1938.

U.S. NEUTRALITY CONTROVERSY

THE captain, navigat- ...ing officers, engin- eers, apprentices, and crews all hate the sea

these days.

By that I mean they hate the conditions in which they have to work. Perhaps it has always been like that, and our idens of the glories of the sea have just been based on ignorance.

After all we have been the world's premier maritime power for 284 years. The officers and men of the merchant navy have been the Royal Navy's first re- serve throughout the centuries. And now these officers and men want to leave the sea. So many of them are looking for "shore jobs" that when a £4 a week harbourmaster's job was vacant recently there were 500 applicants from the sen. The Officers' Federation has been called on to give advice to sailor- men urging them not to put their little savings into mysteri- ous businesses in order to find a shore job.

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FURTHER than that, the

federation and the National Union of Teachers combined to produce a pamphlet for parents,

DON'T

send

your

boy to sea.

ed as, "Don't send your boy to whose refrain might be describ-

sea, Mr. Worthington."

. And the whole story from the water-front is coming to Parlia- ment and the homes of the land- lubbers this year, early in February.

-by-

TREVOR

EVANS

HERE is why our shipping

laws were antiquatod. Tho Merchaht Shipping Act was con- colved in the ideas of Drake's time and the sailing ship days. It has not been amended since 1900.

In the meantime there have come into being motor ships, Diesel engine ships, oil burning ships, ships with super-heaters, and ships with self-trimming dovices.

Britain, still the greatest maritime power in the world, only recently defined what a deck-hand is. But there is no

law indicating wage scales for sailors, firemon, and stewards. Australia is more advanced than Britain in this respect.

A ship trading from n United Kingdom port carrying fewer than twelve passengers may go abroad from the Elbe to Brest over the world's most congested waterways without carrying n single qualified officer on the bridge or in the engine-room.

There are British ships trad-

tive operation, on what date ing between two foreign ports Parliament will be asked to did it cease to be so?" asked without a single Briton amend the Merchant Service the board responsible for the board. Acts, and the Board of Trade welfare of shipping. will be urged to apply safety regulations more rigorously. The Board of Trade did not SINCE the war the Govern-

ed us that all is well,

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NOTES OF THE DAY laws, id on March 26, 1935, ping was safer than ever. along trade union lines. No

PEACE, PROGRESS AND PROSPERITY

in the House of Commons, "Our manning scale and method is a model for the whole world.”

A

few

ment has left control of the know in July 1935 whether an mercantile marine to Within the last year two of agreement of great importance National Mercantile Board, on tho the greatest authorities on ship- to British shipping was in force which are representatives of ping in this country have assur- or not. The fact is, this agree- shipowners, officers, and sea- ment has been in operation men. But the board has no Mr. Walter Runciman, Pres!-

since 1929. dent of the Board of Trade,

statutory authority, and ship- owners can, and do, snap their member of a family distinguish THEN, a month ago the Cham- fingers at its agreements. ed in shipping, and the Minister ber of Shipping issued a Well, the officers have broken responsible for the administra- remarkably reassuring docu- the tradition of their profes- tion of our antiquated shipping ment to prove that British ship- sion and have decided to fight

more velvet-glove methods. "With a view to correcting

The officers' leaders, with any wrong inferences that may be drawn from isolated dis rave deliberation, admit they Mind you, the Officers' (Mer- asters," explained the Cham- have even considered the use of chant Navy) Federation in a ber, "the following statement the strike weapon as an ulti- recent report have irreverently has been issued. Our shipping "aying-up" ship. Captains and

mate argument. His Late Majesty King George Vadded: "If our antiquated Mer- is now two and a half times as

They call it The controversy that is rag-was a firm friend of the League chant Shipping Acts provide a safe as before the war,"

chief engineers ing in the United States on the of Nations, and during his life-model for the world it is time

are exempt from this order. question of an extension of the time showed that his own philo- the world followed a more up was prepared three or four days But the Chamber's statement Aophy had much in common with to-date model in shipping mat- before the end of 1935, and did

What are their complaints? provisions of the Neutrality

A British first officer receives that on which the international in-ters!" Bil

is easily understandable.atitution at Goneva was founded.

not include 1935.

£16 4s, a month. His Dutch On the one side, we have those Like most of the leading statesmen the Board of Trade

Mr. Runciman's advisers at

counterpart recoives £30 13s. 4d, The National Union of Sea- a month; French £25 19s. Gd.; who want America to follow a of his time, this Sovereign months later marred the value whitewashing by the Cham- £21 178. 6d.; Italian £19 48.; and men, furious-at-what-they call German £23 23. 2d.; Danish policy of isolation at all costs; of peace could

recognised that only by the paths of Mr. Runciman's proud boast ber," have prepared statistics Norwegian £19 28, 11d. Only

a great Empire on the floor of the House, on the other, there are ranged progress from strength to greater

from official sources which in- Belgium, Spain, Latvia, and those who believe that the strength, and to lasting prosperity had been asked in the House as 1935.

For four months questions clude the toll of life on sen in Esthonia, .among European United States, although not a

Whenever he had the opportunity to whether subsidies from the

maritime nations, are lower in ho stressed the need for

officers' world annual £2,000,000 public fund including 1935, 186 lives were per cent. of the world's ship- For the three years up to and Britain, still the owner of 27.39 wage scales than member of the League of Nations, should do her utmost Greeks, this Monarch appreciated would be given only to ship was the worst triennial return

recognition of this truth. Like the for helping to build new ships lost from British crews.

That ping. to uphold the principles to that man's best works were accom- over widen thy fun since 1924-26, when, by a co- THE second officer in one of which that body stands com- security: and that security could National

plished in an atmosphere of conditions laid down by the incidence, the toll was also 186. mitted. In view of America's only be assured when peace was (whose functions I will describe

the biggest liners leaving adherence

"We are now beginning to this country for the East,” de- to various pacts guaranteed. It was

for His later).

feel the result of the reductions clared Earl Howe in the House aimed at preventing war and Majesty's funeral that so many of

The reply given by Govern- 1933," declare the seamen.

in manning of British ships in of Lords, "responsible under the stopping it once_it_breaks out, assembled in London recently, and And this is why! Two days after the statesmen and rulers of Europe ment spokesmen was evasive.

captain for the navigation of the ship, hus a maximum salary of there should be doubt as to her the fact that advantage was taken a demand had been made that the busiest year for the lifeboat commands

Round our coasts 1935 was four guiness a week. A typist attitude in such a contingency of their presence there, and in subsidies should be given only service

very nearly an for Paris later, to Institute conversa-

.nineteen as has arisen by Italy openly tions of a diplomatic character is serve the rules, officials at the vessels in distress. In the last longer tolerate conditions which

years. equivalent salary," to good shipowners who ob- There were 376 launches to

They swear they will no disregarding her covenants not easily understood. The criticism Board of Trade wrote to the three years 1,008 lives were permit secret wage cuts by National Maritime Board ask- saved from crippled ships by the owners whose conditions of em- ing if an agreement about cer- lifeboat-men. And out-of-date ployment are that full official tain ships having to carry three foreign ships cannot be blamed. wages are nominally paid, but this agreement is not in effec-only 176 were foreigners. officers was still in force. "If Of the 1,068 rescued seamen, 10 per cent. must be "volun-

talk

to resort to wars of aggression. in some circles that these mco Yet so strong is the American came to mourn and not to tradition

politics seems not to become en-when one remembers how keen was rather far-fetched tangled in outside quarrels that the Inte Sovereign for any labour there is natural hesitancy to in the interests of peace. We are take any step which might in-sure he would have been happy to volve the United States in this sphere, his funeral had served think that, to erown his efforts in another war. Before the to

bring tugether men Neutrality Bill came into being, prominence who could further the supporters of the League con-world's plans for security.

sidered with dubious and

of

anxious eyes the prospect of a these specific circumstances, I rigid American refusal to allow desire it to be understood that any dimunition of U.S. trading any of our people who volun- rights. But it was soon seen tarily engage in transactions of that the Roosevelt Government, any character with either bel-] at the firat test, interpreted ligerent do so at their own étrict neutrality in such a way risk." Whatever may have been as to make possible co-operation President Roosevelt's intentions with the League in collective in taking this course, the im- measures to restrain a peace-pression created was that the breaker. In the proclamation League could proceed with its which he issued in October, the measures against Italy, the de- President put an embargo on knowledge that the

fined aggressor, confident in the

United

the export, to either country States would not stand in the involved in the dispute, of arms, | way of their effectiveness. munitions and implements of When all is said and done, the observation made by the Chinese Ambassador to Wash- ington, Mr. Alfred Sze, that a neutrality polley based on andmere isolation cannot contribute

war. The reasons for hia ng- tion were plainly stated in the words that he was "obliged to recognize the simple

indisputable fact that Ethiopian to world orderliness, hits off the and Italian armed forces position to a nicety. It would combat be strange indeed were America

aro engaged in a which is creating

to be regardless of the necessity a state of war within the intent and mean- power to see that violatora of of doing all that lies within her ing of the joint resolution of world peace are not permitted 'Congress." Ho Added. "In a free hand.

Maritime Board

SIDE GLANCES By George Clark

"I told the talpan we named the kid after him and he didn't seem to like it very much."

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tarily handed back to the com- pany; where four English ap.. prentices work under a Chinese boatswain in a ship whose sole crew consists of four Chinese seamen; where the captain and officers are forced to do manual Inbour, leaving a seaman to steer without a look-out, with instructions to whistle the off- cers if another ship is sighted; where occasional passengers are carried and apprentices have to sleep in the captain's bathroom: and where the shipowners are not responsible for medical treatment for injuries if the vic- tim is landed at an English port. (Shipowners are responsible for medical treatment in a foreign port.)

Officers want a pension. This would add less than 1 per cent: to the running costs of a tramp steamer, and less than per cent. to the running costs of a -- liner..

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EVERY statement. I have made in this article is from an official document of one or other of the shipping bodies.

It is true that there are two. big shipping companies who pay - more than agreed rates;" who, pension their officers; who grant. annual leave, and who fully res? turn with the utmost considera tion the loyalty of their staff.

They are the leaders in a new. movement among shipowners to improve wages and Introduce more liberal manning pro- visions.

The crusade to stamp out the bad owner will continue..