STAGGERING THOUGHTS
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By Frank Burravoe
THE problems of the spreading of holidays and the staggering of working hours can be likened to twins and, in relation to transport, the location of commercial and industrial activities as first cousin to them.
One of the most effective solutions to this threefold problem lies in the hands of transport operators. Just as Dr. Beeching proposes to limit his peak liabilities, so could operators of excursions. tours and express road services restrict the numbers of their vehicles to those required only to satisfy, say, the May to September holiday demand. For although road and rail economics are by no means the same, it is as true of buses and coaches, as it is of trains, that the provision of extra vehicles for a very limited period is disproportionately expensive.
A certain general manager of a large road passenger transport' undertaking which runs every kind of service, approached this problem from a different angle. He decided not to oppose future applications for licences from excursions competitors who specialized in running only in the summer.. Let them, not my company, provide vehicles to meet expensive holiday peaks, he said, perhaps incautiously.
Stage Carriage Services
With stage carriage services the adoption of a policy of restricting vehicle availability is a much more serious matter. as it would affect essential, and not merely pleasure, travel. Yet even in this field some managers are beginning to take a different line. To complainants who have been left waiting at bus stops by fully laden vehicles in the morning and evening peaks, they do not plead guilty and promise to reform in future, but explain instead that every vehicle available is in use and that to buy more for merely an hour or two each day would be too expensive. What the position is under their road service licences is a moot point. Having been granted a licence to serve a particular route, is it incumbent on them to meet the normal peak demand as it arises, without leaving passengers to wait for
the nest bus? • ft the road passenger industry could be mor'.iti/ed to follow the Beeching bugle, The immediate objective of staggered holidays and hours, and the more distant outpost of decentralization of commerce
(and industry) could no doubt be captured. But deliberately to use the transport weapon as an instrument of total war in a campaign of this kind is perhaps contrary to the rules of civilized society. Such mobiliiation is highly unlikely, however. The army of road transport units may be legion, but they have never been drilled into an effective force for operations of this nature.
Strikes Threatened
Response to Government appeals to workpeople and managements for the staggering of working hours has been derisory. In industry, if not in commerce, strikes have been threatened and sometimes called to preserve longstanding patterns in hours of work. Not infrequently, resistance has come from managements as well as workpeople to suggestions that sections of the labour force in a particular factory should start and finish at different times. The whole works had to finish at one uniform time, managements have argued. The rhythm of production would otherwise be disrupted, they have said. Just as machines had to work in complete unison, jobs had to be in mesh, too. It has been useless so far to point out that the staggering of hours would cut waiting time at bus stops for vehicles in short supply at peak traffic times, reduce overcrowding both on rail and road, and enable workers to leave home later and get home earlier.
Faces have been set just as stonily against proposals that one factory might arrange with another in the same district not to have identical starting and finishing times. This would interfere with social life, it is said; community activities in the district would be harmed; workers wanted to enjoy their pleasures and entertainments together; theatres, cinemas sporting events and such like timed their programmes to fit in with common, not staggered hours; national agreements would he violated. The opposing excuses have been endless.
As for shift working, whether two or three in each 24 hours, the less there was of it the better. It had all the other disadvantages, plus the drawback that it was unnatural. The T.U.C.'s report on trade unionism in this age of automation (" Economic Development and Planning -I looks at many matters, such as restrictive practices. demarcation disputes and wage restraints, right in the eye.
but from staggering and shift working it diplomatically averts its gaze.
The staggering of holidays is another illustration of reluctance to change established practices. As long ago as 1945 the Catering Wages Commission, reporting to the Ministry of Labour, forecast grave social consequences if immediate remedial action was not taken. Now, almost 20 years later, the Board of Trade, after roosting for three whole years on this addled egg, hatched a White Paper (Cmd 2105) without any yolk. It assembled a lot of facts but gave no clear guidance, put forward no policy, encouraged no specific steps. We learn from it that 63 per cent of defined holidaymakers go away in July and August; that the ceiling has not been reached; that such concentration in a limited period causes crowding, packed trains, traffic jams, poor service and higher prices, and demands extra staff for hotels, restaurants, shops and amusements. As though it had unearthed a new nugget, the White Paper proclaimed that "the expenditure on road, rail and air transport to meet the demand at peak periods represents a most inefficient use of resources ".
Decentralization
So much for holidays. What about decentralization? The Location of Offices Bureau (LOB) was set up by the Government last March as part of a campaign for decentralization from London. It has been a heart-breaking job in trying to reverse the trend towards further congestion, when each year floor space for at least 15,000 more office workers is added in the central area alone. Only the Government itself has taken the problem seriously by moving out to the provinces thousands of civil servants whose work can be done just as well out of London as in. But as these battalions retreat their places are taken by invading commercial concerns, Tell those concerns that it would be cheaper to install themselves in the provinces and they ignore the advice.
In London saturation point for transport of all kinds has been reached in some districts at certain times and is approaching it in others. If the present growth in road vehicles continues it has been said that by the year 2000 London's arteries will have become a solid irremovable clot of metal.