Selling steady naval construction as deterrence and employment

Would the British public support the construction needed for an equitable treaty fleet?

Probably, if it were presented as a limited deterrence program that also preserved employment after a war understood as a failure to deter.

Interwar support for an economically viable treaty fleet depended on how the programme was presented. The British public of the 1920s and 1930s could understand the First World War as a failure of deterrence. A programme limited to roughly two battleships over two years would be steady rather than extravagant. Its employment effect would make spending visible in shipbuilding communities, allowing a government to present naval readiness as security and economic policy together.