With regard to the shipping subsidy, the report states that the Government is exhibiting a particularly shortsighted view if it persists in its intention to discontinue the provision for the payment of the subsidy after the end of 1937, It is considered important that provision for the subsidy be maintained from year to year, so that in the event of a decline in freight rates the confidence of shipowners may be maintained by the knowledge and benefit of Government support and thus avoid the panic which always hastens íhe journey into a depression, The extent to which shipowners have taken advantage of the provisions of the scrap and build scheme can hardly justify the scheme being called a success. In view of the stampede which occurred to sell old, but in most case serviceable, vessels to foreigners at any price and the delay of the Government in coming to the assistance of shipping, the fact that 50 per cent, of the vessels required to be scrapped had to be repurchased from foreigners and at enhanced prices, shows thal there' was a lack of vision on both
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.