London, Mar. 18.
Introducing the Air Estimates in the House of Commons to-day, Mr. Frederick Montague, Under-Secretary of State for Air, said that, the revised total of last year's Esti at jes, was £16,960,000, This year there was an increase r, of £800,000 and the total was; /£17,850,000. This increase was due, inly, to the provision of up-to-date equipment, which was essential alike for safety and efficiency, providing the needs of civil aviation and an additional outlay on scientific research work.
During the financial year ending March 31 five additional squadrons would have been added to the establishment of the air forces for the purposes of home defence. One of these was a regular squadron and the other four were organized on an auxiliary, has Tt was first intended that 25 per cent. of the home defence force should be on this non-regular basis, but at the present time the proportion was nearly 33 per cent.
wry squadrons did not, in! their early days, require to' be equipped on the same scale as regular squadrons.
They required, in the first instance, ing rather than sce types.
thes jwadrons reached matur-_ ity, provision had to be made for equipping them with up-to-date Mf. Montague continued: like to stress the moderation and unprovocative character the British air policy and expenditure. Our Air Force is substantially ex-laceded in terms of first-line strength by France, Italy and the United States, and the Estimates which am now introducing show an actual reduction on the gross figures compared with the Estimates of five years ago, in st ing contrast with
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.