From his own showing, no such extraordinary and sweeping measure was necessary, for he admits, in a curious and very incidental manner, that only a very small proportion of the shipowners of this country require to be thus controlled; indeed he states,[256] “I have heard one shipowner say that, if a small number of well-known shipowners were put aboard one of their own vessels when she was ready for sea, we should, in the event of bad weather, see that with them had disappeared from our annals nine-tenths of the losses we all deplore!”
An extension of the principle applied to testing of chain cables strongly urged.
But Mr. Plimsoll, in his general statements, only repeated, though in a more sensational and striking manner, arguments which have for years been used in the House of Commons. There has long been a constant cry from a certain portion of the public for Government interference and control; and in Parliament there are always to be found well-meaning representatives of the people, who think that every evil in this wicked world can be remedied by legislative enactments, or Crown supervision. I may mention one instance out of many, viz.: the Act for testing chain cables and anchors, to which I have already referred,[257] which was forced upon the Board of Trade by the House of Commons. Returns, I am aware, can be produced to show that since this Testing Act came into operation, nine or ten years ago, there have been fewer disasters than before, as the result of inferior ground tackle. But figures can be arranged to prove almost anything; and I shall not stop to examine those which have been produced to prove that the chain and anchor manufacturers of this country required to be placed under the immediate control of the Board of Trade. It will be a dark day for the mechanics of Great Britain when this system prevails, and we may then abandon all hope of ever becoming, what we have long aimed to be, the workshop of the world. But what I cannot too strongly condemn is, the principle of appointing Government officials—too frequently underpaid—to superintend or inspect the work of the manufacturer and to regulate the standard of merit. If a manufacturer can produce an article which, by some means or other, is able to pass inspection, it is a matter, now, of far less consequence than formerly to make it of the best description, as, in the case of accident, he screens himself behind the official certificate of its merit. Besides, the test Government, originally, adopted too often destroyed in a great measure the elasticity of chain cables[258]—a quality of the utmost importance to a ship riding at anchor in a heavy sea-way. I quite admit that many vessels and too many lives have been lost through inferior anchors and cables; but a still larger number of vessels have been sacrificed by defective construction, decayed timbers, inferior spars, ropes, and sails, or insufficient stores; and, if the principle of Government interference is correct in the one case, it ought to be extended to the others.
But this system of Government supervision would not end here. An inspection of every chain and anchor manufactory falls far short of the demands of thousands of well-meaning people, who wish to see some potent Board of Trade testing-machines permanently established in every dockyard in the kingdom, as if our shipbuilders knew nothing whatever about the business, or had all arrived at the conclusion that honesty was no longer the best policy, and that the only sure road to riches was to cheat their customers. Nor would even that extension of Government control satisfy them. An estimable friend of mine, a Vice-Admiral in H.M.’s service and a man of learning and of great practical knowledge, asks me in a note I received from him not long since—
“Should there not be some more stringent provisions with respect to the inspection of sailing vessels? It is an old proverb, ‘Who ever saw a dead donkey?’ But who ever saw an old sailing-ship broken up? I am inclined to think that it is more to the interest of small owners to let an old tub go on shore than to bring her safe into port. This works two evils:—1, the danger to human life; 2, the greater rate of insurance on honest owners to make up an average for the dishonest. Should there not be a Board of Trade inspection as to seaworthiness: 1, of every ship once a year; 2, of every ship absent from Great Britain or Ireland over a year continuously, on her return; 3, of every ship where it appears, on her arrival in port, that she had been on shore or had suffered from heavy weather?”
Now there is no doubt that the evils of which my friend complains do exist, and the remedy he proposes has been advocated by many persons besides himself. But would Government inspection, even if practicable, remove or materially tend to mitigate the evil? A very large proportion of the vessels owned in the United Kingdom are now classed either at Lloyd’s or elsewhere, and are periodically inspected; and to the possibility of extending this system, a much more feasible one than any extension of the principle of Government supervision, I shall hereafter refer. Unless a vessel is classed, an underwriter, as a rule, will not take a risk on her, and, unless she is fully insured, it is not the interest of the owner to lose her. In the case of clubs or mutual associations, it would be impossible to have a better watch kept on the vessels admitted, as each member and each person connected with these associations adopts, for his own interest, if for no higher motive, every possible precaution, as, in the event of loss, he becomes a sufferer.
However great the evil, and however lamentable the losses annually occurring on our shores, any very material extension of the legislation now in force, can do little to remedy them. The remedy is in the hands of those persons who are most deeply interested, in that they are certain to become the heaviest sufferers from every loss. It is true that no ship ought to be allowed to proceed to sea which is unseaworthy, but it is the business of all insurance associations to see that the vessels they insure are seaworthy; and no punishment Government could inflict for neglect, would be heavier than that which the owner of an uninsured ship sustains when she is lost, or than that which falls on members of clubs, who admit worthless vessels to their mutual-insurance associations. My experience (and it is not a short one now) teaches me that nearly all legislation in this direction, is unsound in principle; and, as a rule, pernicious in practice. I think, for instance, that we have already erred in the attempt before noticed to measure the standard of merit in the case of anchors and chains, although we may have improved in the mode of testing them.
Mr. Plimsoll moves an Address for a Commission of Inquiry, which was unanimously granted.
Royal Commission on unseaworthy ships, 1873-4.
However, the House of Commons, ever ready to listen to the appeals of humanity, and with the most laudable desire to do what it could to save life and to mitigate the disasters incidental to seafaring pursuits, was fairly disposed to legislate even further in this direction, should it really appear that fresh legislation was necessary; hence, accepting in Mr. Plimsoll an earnest, if not a wise counsellor, of measures for the grandest of all objects—the saving of human life—the House, stimulated by his recent work, unanimously approved of his address to Her Majesty, who was graciously pleased not merely to grant the Commission he had prayed for, but to place upon it “her most dear son and counsellor Alfred Ernest Albert, Duke of Edinburgh,” who, himself a sailor, was fully competent to understand the nature of the inquiry, and had a fellow-feeling for the sailors of all classes, on whose behalf the appeal was made.