B.T.C. Make £8.4m. Profit: £1.6m. from R.H.E.
Page 47
If you've noticed an error in this article please click here to report it so we can fix it.
Ficavy Abstraction of Traffic Through Increase in Illegal Competition by Hauliers Alleged in B.T.C.'s Fifth Annual Report : Bus Profits Well Maintained THE British Transport Commission increased their revenue surplus Irons £2.9m. in 1951 to £8.4m. in 1952, or 0.7 per cent. of gross receipts. A higher rate of surplus was earned during
the first nine months of the year, but during the remainder of 1052 a loss was incurred. Last year's profit was reduced by capital redemption and special charges to £4.5m., an improvement of £4.4m. on the previous year's result. The accumulated deficit is now £31.5m., ahnost half of which is represented by capital redemption.
Rail net receipts last year rose by ' £5.3m. to £37m., but the Road Haulage Executive yielded £1.6m. less and ended the year with a surplus of £1.6m. The Commission's provincial and Scottish bus undertakings showed no change at 13.8m. London Transport's road services incurred a deficit of £300,000, but, as compared with 1951, improved their position by £1.8m.
British Road Services' traffic and mileage dropped and the B.T.C.'s fifth annual report, published last Friday, ascribed part of the loss to illegal com petition by free hauliers. The year under review was described as one of unsettlement and difficulty.
£8m. In Five Years
The report referred particularly to the financial results of B.R.S. during the past five years. After adding certain expenditure on stores and other items, for which, under the Transport Act, 1953, the Commission would be compensated. B.R.S. made a total working surplus in five years of am., equal to 4 per cent. a year on the value of to.neihie assets.
"this figure could not be said to prove failure or inefficiency, and the Commission emphasized the exceptional expenses which 13.R.S. had to face in its formative years. The fleet had been depreciated to 35 per cent, of its cost.
The yield of £8m. had not been as great as the profits on which the acquired undertakings had been compensated. Many hauliers, however, were paid an arbitrary £70 a ton of carrying capacity. In any event, said the report, profits on road haulage had been greatly reduced in recent years.
An all-round increase in efficiency in B.R.S. was claimed. Using 100 as the index figure for the beginning of 1951, B.R.S. vehicles were each covering 11 l.9 miles at the end of 1952, and the index figure for miles per driver, mate and vanguard was 105.
This improvement in efficiency, said the report, was obtained only by organizing on a large scale. The total
staff employed per 100 tons carried had fallen by over a quarter since December, 1948. It had been estimated that in 1952, operating costs would rise by nearly Dm., but, in fact, economies brought about by the concentration of road haulage limited the advance to only £400,000.
Last year, B.R.S. carried 42m. tons, or 5m. tons less than in 1951. The total mileage dropped by 58m. to 7I0m. Empty mileage increased from 17.7 per cent. in 1951 to 19 per cent. in 1952. The undertaking's results were affected by political uncertainty, general recession in trade, the continuance of permits in respect of traffic which the RILE. themselves could carry and an increase in illegal competition.
"The Executive maintained their share of the smaller volume of traffic available for conveyance by road," said the report, but added: "A cause of great concern to the Executive in 1952 was the increasing extent to which independent operators were known to be ignoring the 25-mile radius restriction and permit conditions generally. These illegal activities, combined sometimes with indiscriminate rate-cutting, contributed in no small measure to the progressive decline in tonnages carried by the Executive. Although there were a number of successful prosecutions, the
mt majority of these abuses went unchecked."
701 Trunk Services
Trunk services were further developed and at the end of the year there were 701 registered services operated by 4,524 vehicles. Smalls and parcels services were reduced to conform with the diminished demand. Energetic development took place in the use of pallets internally in parcels depots and for through-transport.
The total amount claimed by customers in respect of lost or damaged goods and the number of claims were lower than in 1951.
Dealing with research, the report said that, following a study of the subject in Holland, a committee set up by the Road Haulage and Railway Executives had built prototype containers which could be lifted on and off road and rail vehicles without the use of cranes. Detailed investigation was begun into the relative advantages or disadvantages of articulated and rigid vehicles, with q without drawbar trailers.
Experiments were made with shockabsorbing mats made from scrap rubber to protect earthenware and other fragile goods in transit. They were highly satisfactory. Their design had been slightly modified and the tests continued.
At the end of last year, B.R.S. had 39,320 motor vehicles and articulated units, 3,805 additional trailers and 1,077 service vehicles, as well as horses and private cars. The staff numbered 72,579. Between May and December last year, 60 members of the R.H.E. staff who were earning £750 a year or more resigned.
The gross book value of the Commission's investments in road transport, excluding shareholdings in B.E.T. bus companies, was, at December 31 last, as follows: Railway collection and delivery and other services, £14.9m.; B.R.S., £65.7m.; bus companies, £49.5m.; London Transport, £43.5m.; making a total of £173.6m.
Dealing with passenger transport, the report said that railway officers and bus managers had been instructed to regard rail and road passenger services as two sections of a single system. The transfer of services between several companies in the Tilling Group, together with the integration of certain small undertakings purchased by the Commission, improved facilities and reduced costs.
The Scottish companies' 4,368 buses and coaches carried 2.4 per cent. more passengers and covered 3.6 per cent. more miles than in 1951. • Net traffic receipts rose from £1.52m, to £1.68m. Working expenses. advanced by 1.27d. (7.3 per cent.) to 18.62d. per mile. Oilengiced single-deckers averaged 12.1 m.p.g. and double-deckers 10.17 m.p.g. Petrol-engined single-deckers yielded 9.71 m.p.g. and petrol-engined doubledeckers 5.37 m.p.g.
Tilling Profit Down
The Tilling Group of companies carried 1.5 per cent, more passengers and covered 2.2 per cent, more miles, but net traffic receipts fell from £2.3m. to £2.1m. Working expenses, at 19.62d. per mile, were 1.53d. (8.5 per cent.) higher than in 1951. Oil-engined singledeckers covered 13.16 m.p.g. and double-deckers 11.87 m.p.g.; petrolengined single-deckers yielded 9.81 m.p.g. and double-deckers, 5.34 m.p.g.
London Transport's 8,077 buses and coaches handled 0.3 per cent. more traffic and travelled 4.7 per cent. more miles, but the 1,770 trolleybuses carried 6.1 per cent, fewer passengers and covered 1.3 per cent. fewer miles.
Working expenses on buses and coaches rose by 2.27d. to 27.14d. per mile-an increase of 9.1 per cent. -and on the trolleybuses by I.78d. (6.8 per cent.) to 28.16d. per mile, Net traffic receipts showed a deficit of £317,019 on the buses and coaches, a profit of £321,417 on the trolleybuses and a loss of £312,367 on the trams, giving a total deficiency on road transport of £307,969.
Fuel-consumption rates of the oilengined buses were as follows: singledeckers, central buses, 10.84 m.p.g.; country buses, 11.42 m.p.g.; coaches, 11.5 m.p.g. Double-deckers, central buses, 9.52 m.p.g.; country buses, 10.62 m.p.g., coaches 11.58 m.p.g.