THE RAILWAY ROAD TRANSPORT BILLS.
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The Case for the Municipalities Against the Bills Opened After the Adjournment.
AFTER a short Whitsuntide adjournment the Joint Select Committee of both Houses of Parliament which is considering the Road Transport Bills resumed its sittings on June 4th.
Mr. James Lieve.sley, a member of the Preston Committee of the Commercial Motor Users' Association and a member of Blackpool Corporation, appeared as a witness against the Bills. Replying to Mr. Moon, K.C., he stated that on July 31st, 1927, which was a day of maximum traffic for Blackpool, the number of people reaching the town by railway was 135,000, by motorcoach 31,160, and by private motorcars and cycles 32,195. He submitted that, if the railways engaged in road transport, some of the existing concerns in Black' pool would soon be`but of business, as the railways had great advantages over small owners in respect of their stations and staffs. If one quarter of the existing road traffic in his area were taken by the railways the profit would be gone.
In cross-examination he expressed his belief that the railways would get privileges from the Corporation Gf Blackpool because of the large volume of passenger traffic they brought to the town.
Case for Municipalities.
Mr. E. E. Charteris, K.C., in opening the case for the municipalities petitioning against the Bills, said he represented 51 municipalities with a rateable valuation of £73,000,000 and a population of 11,000,000. It was owing to the absence of transport facilities which would enable people to live outside the city area and travel to and from business that municipalities had developed tramway and omnibus services.
Their services were bound to specific routes decided by Parliament and the Ministry of Transport, but the municipalities had built'up an agency of great public utility at a cost estimated at between £80,000,000 and 190,000,000. Some 864 local Acts and provisional orders had been involved. The municipalities, he contended, had created a huge new traffic and the railways were now seeking untrammelled freedom to take away as much of that traffic as they could get. He asked the Committee to give protection to municipalities.
It had not yet been shown by one scrap of evidence that the new powers were going to benefit a single being apart from the railway companies, whose case was that their railway revenues would be improved. He submitted that the state of those revenues did not justify the application for the powers sought in the Bills. The municipalities were not prepared to see adequate services depleted merely to improve railway revenue. They had spent public money for the benefit of the public and were not out for profit, yet Parliament was now being asked to open the door to a competitor which had Parliamentary advantages over the municipalities.
The first witness for the municipalities was Sir William Hart, Town Clerk of Sheffield. Be stated that there were 96 local authorities owning and operating tramways, 23 operating trolley vehicles and 81 operating motor omnibus services. Local authorities were apprehensive that serious harm would be done to their services if the railways obtained the powers sought. Of the 81 local authorities operating omnibus services 33 had powers to run within their own areas and 48 had powers to run within and without their own areas. They owned and worked 3,000 omnibuses, some 8,000 people being employed. The revenue amounted to about £3,500,000, the passengers numbering 402,000,000 a year, The municipalities had endeavoured to keep their services up to the requirements of the public and should be protected against the competition of the railway companies. He suggested that vehicles operated by railway companies should not be permitted to pick up and set down passengers on the tramway routes of the municipalities.
In cross-examination by Mr. Macmillan, K.C., for the promoters, the witness admitted that a number of municipalities owning tramways had not appeared against the Bills and that in order to protect their tramways against omnibus competition municipalities had started their own omnibus services. lie agreed that municipal omnibuses were now to be found operating many miles from their base.
Intensive and Wasteful Competition.
Mr. William Chamberlain, chief engineer and general manager of the Leeds Corporation Tramways, was the next witness. He said that in the matter of essential locomotion the work done by the tramways compared favourably with the work done by the railways and the public had as big an interest in transport by tramways, as it was calculated that they carried 31 passengers to one passenger carried by the railways. The amount contributed by tramway undertakings in 1926 in relief of the rates was £334,000, by which the railways benefited. Mr. Charteris pointed out that the London Traffic Advisory Committee in a report presented to the Minister of Transport stated that the deficit on the tramways in London was due to the intensive and wasteful competition of omnibuses. Mr. Chamberlain agreed that if the railways got the powers they were now seeking there would be reproduced throughout the country exactly the same position as existed at present in London.
If the railways obtained these powers they would be the only statutory undertakings, apart from municipal authorities, running omnibuses. Mr. F. G. Thomas, K.C., representing the promoters, questioned witness as to the loss on the London tramways, and asked whether it were not true to say that in the provincial areas the tramway undertakings had availed themselves of the more modern method of omnibus transport. Mr. Chamberlain: In some cases that is so, but in Leeds we have not been able to develop as fully as we would wish.
Counsel: But you have the powers?—We have powers to run omnibuSes within our own area, Mr. Thomas pointed out that that was a power not possessed by the municipal authorities in the London area. There was, he added, the further 'distinction that in the Metropolitan area the local authorities were not the licensing authorities.
• Mr. Howell, Town Clerk of WolverhamPton, then gave evidence with regard to the road-transport services of the Wolverhampton area. In reply to Mr. Macmillan, K.C., for the railway companies, he said that he did not object in principle to the railway companies having road powers so long as they operated under the safeguards laid down in the clause proposed by the municipal authorities petitioning • against the Bills.
Mr. Macmillan: You have in Wolverhampton a complete monopoly of transport?—Subject to this, that anyone can apply for a licence.
Witness agreed that only two persons had applied for a licence during the past few years and that their applications had not been granted. Enjoying a monopoly in Wolverhampton, the municipal authority had not fleeced the pUblic nor feathered their own nest at the public expense.