Northern Times.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1859-02-07 00:00:00

Shipping, extending back to a sufficiently remote
date, that the very reverse of that statement was
the true state of the case. He takes, for instance •
their own period of unexampled success, when
British Shipping increased beyond all precedent.
" Let us take," he says, " the last fifty years, and
let us deal with it fairly and as men. We will
take from 1807 to 1857—that is the last fifty years;
and we will divide it it into two periods of twenty- ,
five years of protection, and twenty-five years of,
to a very large extent, free trade policy. We find
that in 1807 we owned 2,238,000 tons of shipping.
We find that, twenty-five years afterwards, in
1832, we owned 2,618,000 tons of shipping. In
1857, we owned 5,531,000 tons of shipping. Now,
what is the fact ? During this period -of unex-
ampled success, when British Shipping increased
beyond all precedent, during that twenty-five years
Shipping increased 15 per cent. ; but during the
twenty-Ave years of a free-Oade policy, Shipping
increased 110 per- cent." This, then, is a very
different story from that which we are too much
in the habit of hearing of the Shipping Interest. •
And it is a - story that is authenticated by
unquestioned statistics of the case, —and statistics,
too, be it remembered, in the hands of a practical
man, -himself a large shipowner, and intimately
conversant with, as well as deeply interested in,
the whole question at issue, in. its _ practical
bearings. " You must all be aware," he says to
them, " that I myself am deeply interested in
British Shipping. • All the capital I have in
Shipping, is in British Shipping ; all the stock I
hold, is iu British stock. 'I hold no foreign stock.
My interests are essentially and personally,
independent altogether of my political opinions,
in British Shipping, because I am a British
shipowner myself to a very large extent. And
do you for one moment imagine that if I thought,
as a British shipowner, that I would gain' by
protection, I would not adopt the views of the
Protectionists ?" The testimony of one thus
circumstanced, therefore, on the side of the
question which he' here feels it his duty to take,
must, from his particular position, be as impartial
as it is important. And the fact, adduced upon
such testimony, of our having built about 1,000,000
more tons during the period of free trade, than we
did during the same period before the repeal of the
Navigation Laws, is one that speaks volumes of
itself in support' of the present policy, let others
of less liberal, and, it may be feared, less
enlightened views, rail against it as they may.
At the same time, we repeat, there are anoma-
lies and there are wrongs in the state of the case,
as it stands in practical operation, which must of
necessity be corrected. There are certain unjust
burdens which oppress the Shipping Interest ;
and these must of. course be removed. There is
the duty on timber, that is an oppression, and in
the present circumstances of that Interest alto-
gether indefensible. There is the payment of
light dues; and there is the question of pilotage,
—the Shipowners have just ground of complaint
in both these matters. They have also but too
much reason to complain of the denial of recipro-
city by other nations. As the hon. member for
Tynemouth justly remarked, " we have given to
other nations our all. We have thrown open our

ports to. other nations, because we thought it for

our own interest to do so; but notwithstanding

that we have thrown open our ports to other
nations, many other nations have not thrown open
their ports to us." This is certainly most unfair.
It is altogether undeniable, indeed, that there is
still much to be set right, as regards justice to the
Shipping Interest ; but which may be done, there
is no doubt, without any invasion of the prin-
ciples on which the national policy respecting it
has been placed. The whole question of these
practical, these incontrovertible grievances Will
be brought under the consideration of Parliament
during the present Session, and there is every
reason to expect that full justice will be done
to this great staple Interest of our country.