How Hermes opens a small-carrier loophole

How would the proposed 12,000-ton threshold apply to HMS Hermes?

Hermes might sit outside the counted carrier tonnage, encouraging navies to build useful small carriers below the threshold.

The answer treats the threshold as a design incentive, not merely an accounting detail. If Hermes does not consume fleet-carrier tonnage, Britain can use small carriers for secondary missions while reserving its allowance for larger ships. Repeated construction could improve the type and create an important light-carrier lineage before the London conference. That possibility is one reason the later treaty might need a separate small-carrier category.