Mr. Black.

6223. Might I have particulars as to the number of the students in each of these places? What I should like to know is how much per annum it costs the State for each of the students in the various establishments, so that we might have a comparative statement to see that they are all on a level?—(Sir Oswyn Murray.) At the Royal Naval Staff College and the Naval War College at Greenwich the number of officers under training of various sorts is about 250. Of course, there are a great many entirely different classes of officers, from very senior officers, who are going through War courses, down to ordinary junior officers, who are going through specialised training. I have not here a

statement showing the cost per officer, but I could put in a statement showing that.

Chairman.

6224. Distinguishing, of course, between the Naval War course and the junior course, and giving it as so much per head? We could distinguish, I think, between the Staff College, the War College and the Royal Naval College, but it would be impossible to distinguish between the different classes of students who are gong through the Naval Colleges.

Mr. Black.

6225. But we could get an average?Yes.

5 June, 1924.]

Sir Fredric Wise.

6226. You gave it last year?_We gave a long statement on the subject to the Estimates Committee, and it is in one of the Appendices to their Report which I have here, but I do not think we worked out the actual cost. Mr. Naef tells me that the Royal Naval College we work out at £338; the Staff College at £669 and the War College at £530.

6227. Per annum each?-Per annum. Might I just deal with the other Colleges; at Keyham we now have about 150 officers studying; we had a smaller number than that in 1922-1923, because only shortly before that we reopened the College, and we were working up to a larger number of students. At the Naval College at Dartmouth we had roughly 479, and the cost there was £300 gross; that is not taking into account the contributions we receive from the parents.

to that cost of £669? Would he have any money allowances, or is that all the actual cost of their upkeep and training expenses?-That is the cost of the instructional staff, lecturers, the upkeep of the buildings, and so on. It does not cover their pay while they are going through the course.

6231. Do you think this £69 would be a normal amount, or would that be above the average?-I should think that would be about the normal amount. If my recollection is right, it compares very well with the cost at the Army Staff College at Camberley.

Sir George McCrae.

6235. With regard to sub-head A, Salaries, Wages and Contingencies, you have a saving of £10,844. And in the footnote you explain that this is due mainly to various appointments remaining unfilled, and reduced expenses resulting from re-organisation, in all £7,609. Could you tell the Committee what is the nature of this re-organisation that has taken place that has brought about this considerable saving?-We made rearrangements as regards the servant staff, which reduced the cost of that very considerably.

was

counter

6236. Does that account for the £7,600? -That accounts for a very large amount of the savings; it was the principal item. 6237. Then I observe that under subhead C: Training of Naval Cadets, there is a surplus of £4,126, but you explain that there was an actual saving of that £16,600, but that balanced by salaries relating to a prior year of £11,576. How comes it that salaries of a prior year were off-set against the saving of £16,600 ?-This was mentioned in the previous year's Appropriation Account, under Vote 5, where the saving then of £18,000 was shown as partly due to expenditure on salaries not having been brought to account within the year of £11,576. It was a most unfortunate result of a trivial error; that is to say, the vouchers for the salary expenditure during one quarter got lost in the post, or somewhere, and by the time the duplicate was received the accounts for the one year had been closed; therefore this had to come into the next.

6238. You made no provision in the Estimates for this year for these salaries that were outstanding?-Oh, no; that is all cleared off now.

[Continued.

6239. Does it mean that in the year following this this actual saving of £16,600 will not be counterbalanced by any arrears of salary for the previous year, but it will continue?-Those economies that were made are most of them economies that will be repeated every

year.

6240. Recurring economies ?—Yes; they were reductions of staff, and so on. We appointed a Committee to go into the whole of the organisation at Dartmouth, and they made economies to the extent of, I think it was, £30,000 or £40,000 a

year.

6241. Did that arise out of the Geddes axe? No, we had it in mind to do it before the Geddes axe.

6242. It was coincident with the Geddes axe? Yes.

Sir Fredric Wise.

6243. With regard to the Royal Naval College at Greenwich, I think we made

some suggestions to you in the Estimates Committee last year. Have they been

carried out?-I think some of them have been carried out, and we have had, in addition, a similar Committee to that which sat at Dartmouth going through the whole of the organisation at Greenwich to see what savings we could make there. That report is now before the Board. I do not think we will get any saving comparable to the large saving at Dartmouth, because we found that the Greenwich arrangements were, on the whole, very economical. We compared them with those at Camberley and those at some of the Colleges at Cambridge, and we came to the conclusion that there was not a great field for economy.

6244. Do you think this reduction of £10,000 odd under sub-head A will be a permanent reduction?-The following year we took £114,000 and this year we have taken £112,000; that is to say we are repeating the saving.

Sir George McCrae.

6245. There is a very large surplus of £105,000 on this Vote compared with the actual grant of £524,000?-You will see that it was very largely accounted for by the under-spending on sub-head O, which is the scientific research sub-head. Part of that saving was due to the very great difficulty that the Director of Scientific Research had in collecting a scientific staff to get on with the inquiries and researches which were in prospect, but which he could not start until he had the expert staff. Part of it was due to the oversanguineness, that we have already referred to, as to the extent of progress that would be made with those researches during the year. We have taken both those circumstances into account in subsequent years, and you will see in the present year we have not made similar provisions.

6246. Under sub-head O you actually spent less than half of what you expected. You estimated for £96,800 and you only spent £42,700?-Yes, that is so; from the point of view of research it was a very disappointing result.

6247. Was that because you were going in for some new method of reorganisation? It was partly because the Director of Scientific Research, an appointment

only made after the war, had not been able to collect his whole staff together; but it was also due to progress being slower through coming up against unexpected difficulties and So on in scientific researches.

6248. Do you remember what the Estimate is for the present year?-(Mr. Watson.) £123,000. (Sir Oswyn Murray.) That is not really comparable, because that includes an entirely new item. We now pay a certain proportion towards the War Office Chemical Research, £60,000, so that the comparable figure is £63,000 this year as against £96,000 that we took in the year you are referring to. I may say the difficulties as regards staff are practically over now, and I think that the amount we have taken is justified.

6249. Do you remember what your actual expenditure was in the year just closed: 1923-24?-No, but we did not spend the figure that we have got in the Estimates; and we have cut that by £30,000 this year.

Mr. Arnold Williams.

6250. Is it a fact that we have about four times as many on the staff in the experimental Department as we had in pre-war days?-We practically had no research staff pre-war. It was, I think, one of the great deficiencies in Admiralty

[Continued.

Chairman.

we had exactly the same experience: that officers and men were not willing to come up for voluntary training. In the present year we have made a very large cut, and brought our Estimate down to the expenditure of the previous two years.

6260. It is rather a serious matter that these officers and men are not coming forward for training, is not it? I think it is very largely due to the after-effects of the war, and that it will die away

soon.

6261. How much of this saving is due to the reduction in the period of training? I observe that you made a reduction in the period of training; is that a material item?-That was not the chief reason for the saving by any means, I think. The chief saving was due to officers and men not coming up for training.

6262. Sub-head A, Salaries and Allowances, shows a big surplus. Was not it possible to anticipate these savings? For instance, under Sub-head F, "Postponement of refits of ships." Could not that have been foreseen? There are three very large surpluses on this Vote ?-That is in naval yards abroad.

6263. Take the ones at home first. Was not it possible to foresee the staff requirements being smaller than estimated? -I think we must look upon these as some of the after-savings that I was

referring to the other day in consequence of the general revision of our Fleet requirements due to the Washington Treaty. You reduce your Fleet and then gradually you find you can reduce the staff.

6264. There was nearly £100,000 saved by the postponement of refits in the naval yards abroad; how did that come about? It is £40,000 in respect of that.

6265. Yes, the £100,000 also includes the wages of men and hire of teams, but it says in the note: "Postponement of refits of ships"?-Yes; there was £40,000 due to that, and those were due to

5 June, 1924.]

[Continued.

changes in the programme of refits decided upon by the naval staff during the year. 6266. Are not there invariably changes which lead to under-spending? I do not think that, in any ordinary year, you get the state of things that we had in the year just after the Washington Treaty.

Mr. Black.

6267. Might I ask whether there is any proportionate basis for this contribution from the Government of India of £12,500; is it calculated upon the expense this country has?-You will see it on page 8 of the Account. The Government of India give us £100,000 on condition that we maintain certain ships in Indian waters, and that is divided pro rata over certain Votes.

6268. Could you give us any idea as to what the total cost to the nation of those ships in Indian waters would be?-It is very much more than £100,000.

6269. Would it be £1,000,000?-Oh, no, not as much as that; but we look upon the £100,000 as an ungenerous contribution in view of what we provide.

6270. Has it been the same amount for a number of years?-Yes, quite a large number of years. The question of adding to it has been taken up from time to time, but I dare say you appreciate what difficulties there are in getting the Government of India to increase a charge of that sort at the present time.

Sir Henry Craik.

6271. The £12,500 appearing on page 29 must be a drop in the bucket ?-It is part of the £100,000. You will see on page 8 the £100,000 is split up over the various Votes. The actual basis on which you split it up, Mr. Naef, is according to what you think is the proportionate amount of the expenditure on the various Votes resulting from the maintenance of those ships in Indian waters? (Mr. Naef.) Yes.

6272. That must be a very small portion of the maintenance of one ship for a small part of the year? (Sir Oswyn Murray.) The £100,000 does not really represent the cost of those ships; you cannot pretend that it does; it is a contribution.

6273. The £12,500 must represent, as I say, a very small part of the cost of one ship for a part of the year?-The maintenance of the ships and the crews

would not be on Vote 8; that would bear the repairs and maintenance of the ships. Vote 1 would bear the cost of the ships' crew, and so on; there is £28,000 on Vote 1.

6274. The additional cost of those repairs which have resulted from their being in Indian waters, rather than elsewhere, is all that you would cover by this? The £12,500 does not represent any particular proportion of the real expense. The expense of repairing those ships might be very much greater in a particular year.

Mr. Arnold Williams.

6275. I find that the staff on Vote 8 is 800 to 850 more than pre-War; is that about right?—Yes.

6276. The men are about 300 more. That means, approximately, that it is taking one staff man now to look after 17 as against 23 in pre-War days. Is there any reason for that?-The conditions are not quite similar. We have, of course, one more yard, which immediately means an increase in the proportion of officers. Another thing is that a good many classes who were classed as workmen before the War are now classed as subordinate officers in the dockyard; I think most naturally there is always a push from down below to get their position improved, and to be looked upon as an officer and not as a man.

6277. Is that really an explanation of the difference, because it is quite a serious one?-The chief item, of course. is the additional yard at Rosyth. There was a considerable amount of evidence on this point given before the Select Committee on Estimates last year; I think they took the items one by one, and you will find the whole of them in the evidence given before that Committee.

Sir George McCrae.

6278. On sub-head B, under Dockyards at Home, the saving is £397,000, and I observe that £215,000 of that is due to reduction in wages. Was that reduction going back to a peace basis after the War experience? There was a fall in the wages in the shipbuilding and engineering industries generally, and the dockyards followed the fall outside, as they do always.

6279. That was when the bonus was taken off in the outside yards, was not it? Yes.