Evening star., 1923-09-19

What England and all Of Europe
needs today is moral gesture on
the part of America" This is what
Ramsay Mcdonald, leader of the OPP
position in the British house Of COM
mons and thought by many to be
the next prime minister, said to me
few weeks ago. Is this the solu-
ton?
Great Britains Industrial leadership
was largely built on cheap coal. Her
great merchant marine likewise rest
ed on coal. Her imports were raw
Ematerials-heavy, and bulky--and her
exports the lighter manufactured
articles. Thus her merchant marine
carried to other countries vast guam
titles of cheap coal at low rates, in
lieu OF other ballast. In 1913, out of
322 million dollars worth Of raw ma
terials exported, coal amounted to
261, million. Her greatest coal Gus
toner was France. Now France has
her own coal. England must look
for other customers.
Her average monthly output of coal
in 1918 was 24,342,000 tons. In 1922
II was 21,235,000 tons. Since the
Ruhr invasion by France Great Brit
ain has been selling coal to Germany,
but the effective demand there is de-
creasing. Today she is mining 90
per cent less coal than In 1913 and
1t is costing nearly three times as
much per ton as 1t costs to mine in
the United States. Her increasing
costs of both mining and transport
are making this an extremely difficult
problem to handle.
Her iron and steel industry largely
rests on cheap coal. She sells these
things to Europe, but but Just now now
or iron. In 1918 Great Britain pro-
duced a monthly average of 1.51S,00o
tons of iron and steel, as against an
average of $4,000 tons in 1922, q
decrease of 80 per cent Conditions
somewhat improved but are still
tagging behind 1873.
II Il y X
The same general conditions rule
in the shipping and shipbuilding ac-
tivities. Competition is now very
keen, for the world gross tonnage
grew from 10000 tons to $1,000. 900
tons in eight years. Now about 20
per cent of the worlds tonnage is
ANAC' mas
declined from 2.2S5. 900 cons in March,
1922. to 1,492,O0o tons in Ma rch, 1929.
There is more unemployment today
than ever before in the history of the
English shipbuilding industry
In the textile industry matters are
not any better. In 1913 Great Britain
exported s,00O. 100000 square yards of
cotton piece goods. In 1921 not quite
5000, 100000. about SO per cent a.
much; 1922 was better. but still tn
figure is less than so per cent Of
1913. Recovery so far in 1923 is
startlingly slow. and why?
A high price for raw cotton, world
wide trade depression, loss of mar
kets in the bad money countries,
tariff barriers, especially in India, and
growth of cotton mills (inteuse ma
tionalism) in India, Japan, Italy,
Germany and the United States
These activities outside of England
mean loss of bread and butter to
thousands OF families in Great Brit
ain.
If we include the total British ex-
ports and imports and translate the
figures into the price levels of the
year, we find the industrial condition
of Great Britain extremely serious.
Imports and exports in 1920, for
instance, were actually less than 75
per cent of those in 1913. The amount
of imports in the first six months of
1928 is only 81 per cent Of those for
the first half of 1915, while the ex-
ports are only So per cent of the
exports of the same year.
With the English trade in such a
BAD way, growing unemployment Is