HC Deb 18 July 1884 vol 290 cc1603-4
MR. O'SHEA

asked the Secretary to the Admiralty, The total cost of H.M.S. Polyphemus to the 1st of July; and, whether he is in a position to state that she is throughout in a state of absolute efficiency for all the purposes for which she was originally designed and constructed?

MR. CAMPBELL-BANNERMAN

The total amount expended on the polyphemus, for labour and materials, down to the 1st of July was £248,475. I am not in a position to make, in regard to her, the sweeping assertion which the hon. Member invites from me. The ship is at this moment in hand for the purpose of receiving new boilers in place of the experimental boilers with which she was originally fitted, and of having her torpedo tubes altered in order to carry out experiments in under-water torpedo discharge. I am not sure that I am aware of all the purposes which her designers may have had in view; but I believe that she has fully satisfied their main expectations; and when the present work upon her is finished—which is expected to be in September—she will be a most formidable and useful vessel.