when i was young

[Ivan Cloherty]

Tony

During the latter part of the war, a lot of ships were under the American, Norweigan, Belgium, French etc flags, All the European flagged ships naturally went back under their own companies countries control to service their own countries needs, which was only natural,they had previously been under the control of the MOWT. That left a shortage of tonnage to service our needs. The American ships went back to the USA to service their needs, as in those days there was a lot of goods moved between East and West coasts by sea, they also put a lot on servicing all their needs in the Pacific rim where they had a lot of stations, including the rebuilding of Japan. They also put a lot of Liberty and Victory ships into the reserve fleet in Chesapeake Bay being uncertain of how the post war era (Russia) would pan out and didn't want to be caught with their pants down, so these ships were taken out of the Atlantic Service, also there was a shortage of American Seamen as these men returned to their farms in the mid west who were short of labour

Most of the British ships left to service our needs were old, small and losing money every trip so owners could not afford to replenish their fleets at the speed they wished to as neither funds or Government funds were available (the Country was broke due to the war) although new ships were ordered and some on the stocks they were slow to come into service, as the shipyard unions would not allow demarcation of various trades and a lot of skilled tradesmen were lost whilst serving in the services and their places had been taken by women welders and riveters. The men who had these skills and had returned to the yards refused to work with these women (or the unions did) seeing it as a way to get better pay and conditions. So the accumulative events all conspired to prevent importing the goods that it needed, there just was not the tonnage available in the immediate post war era to service the country's needs, so priority was given to the essential foods to keep the country going.

Few ships came into service in the 1945 to 1947 period it was only after 1948 that the fleets started to gain new tonnage, this again due to the union actions but also building was not fast due to the shortage of steel plates for ship building, because the latter was the effect of a Catch 22 situation, do we import food to feed the nation, a priority, or do we import the necessary minerals to make the steel so we can build ships quicker, so the compromise had to be both, but it slowed down the rate of recovery

Nothing at all to do with EU type regulations, just a shortage of ships, skilled labour and funds, hope this helps

[English Margaret]

and knockout

[robpage]

One of the biggest problems with EU regulations and twenty three years in the fresh food industry , i have seen more than a few of them , is that we as a country have not got a clue how to deal with them .

A classic case a few years ago was an East Anglian slaughterhouse had a £500,000 refurbishment , but a few months later they were told they woulkd have to close as the height of the rooms in the listed building were 5 centimetres too low . The owners complained bitterly and hosted a trip for the local EHO to a slaughterhouse in Normandy where the ceilings were even lower and there was about half a metre of drooppings on the floor , that the cattle were wading in . This was similarly an historic building , but had a current operating licence . The EHO discovered that the company had a special derrogation to operate , a common EU term for a dodge in the regulations . The East Anglians applied for one and it was granted . The EHO was applying the rules to the letter , the French EHO to the spirit .

I did a course in the updated Fire Regulations a few years ago , There is to be approximatly a minimum of 22 metres distance to the nearest fire escape exit route from a building , the building / planning officers on the course applied it to be the minimum exact measurement on the practical course section , despite the word "Approximate " being clearly stated in the regulations . They argued with teh Fire Officer from the Fire Brigade college at Morton in the Marsh , that the regulations must be mistaken as these things should be exact . The Officer taking the course had been involved in the UK version of these regulations and tried to explain how to use common sense .


That is the problem wit the rules NO COMMON SENSE is applied by the enforcement authorities , despite there being a provision in most of the regulations to do so

[happy daze john in oz]

You may recall that back in the mid 70's there was a shortage of potatoes and supplies were being sourced from as far away as Canada and Eygpt. A potato farmer down near All Hallows had a great crop as he had water available. He was fined for producing too many per acre. Eu regulation say only so mnay can be grown per acre. What sort of people are running this two bit outfit?????