Why the Royal Navy did not build large cruisers in wartime

Why did the Royal Navy appear unenthusiastic about large cruisers?

Treaty limits blocked them in peacetime, and wartime production favored proven six-inch cruiser designs already moving through the yards.

The Royal Navy was not hostile to large cruisers, but the Washington system restricted the design space in peacetime. Britain considered 9.2-inch-gun ships comparable in role to an Alaska-class large cruiser, with nine- or twelve-gun arrangements among the possibilities. Once war began, yards could produce more useful ships faster by continuing six-inch cruiser families already in series rather than stopping lines to introduce a new type. Earlier 20,000- to 25,000-ton battlecruisers could cover some of the large-cruiser mission, but 40,000-ton capital ships could not be built in enough numbers for dispersed cruiser duties. That left a continuing conceptual niche for a roughly 15,000- to 20,000-ton cruiser even though Britain never put one into wartime production.