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Dead letter days
by janus
IN THE closing stages of a General Election campaign it may seem idle to speculate on what the next Parliament will do. But it is not altogether impossible that whatever Government is returned will at least be slow to take further action on the unfinished business of the Transport Act 1968.
On the future of road transport there has been little if any election discussion apart from the promise in the Conservative Party manifesto to repeal quantity licensing. There are few votes to be harvested on that theme and there is a faint indication that even operators are losing interest.
Some of them would prefer a moratorium. This may be no more than the all-too-human inclination rather to bear those ills we have than fly to others that we know not of. On the other hand, a pause for reflection may be justified.
THE impetus of Mrs Barbara Castle's Transport Bill swept all before it. It was presented as a gigantic package deal which had to be accepted as a whole. Even the official Opposition were for the most part carried away on the tide. They have accepted implementation up to the present stage. Apart from quantity licensing and the fitting of tachographs there would seem to be general agreement on other provisions for which appointed days are still awaited, including the further reduction in drivers' hours and the introduction of the transport manager's licence.
In no case is there any hurry or obligation to name the day. The surge of energy and even enthusiasm generated by the Bill has spent itself withothe introduction of so many changes early in 1970. The tide may recede, particularly when the effect of the changes begins to make itself apparent.
With its emphasis on quality rather than traffic availability 0 licensing has been widely welcomed as a better method than the old carriers' licensing system. Whatever the intangible or actual value of an A or B licence even hauliers have been strangely reconciled to its disappearance.
They may have calculated that they were getting something in its place. The carrier's licence was to them a symbol of the scarcity value of their services. A limited quota of vehicles available to carry the traffic that was offered could be increased only through the medium of the traffic courts.
From one point of view the value has disappeared; from another it may seem that the situation has not greatly changed except for those vehicles with an unladen weight not exceeding 30 cwt. Anybody who wishes to become a haulier still has to prove his case. This applies equally to traders who want to carry their own traffic and to existing operators applying to increase the size of their fleet beyond the margin granted by the Licensing Authority.
Some hauliers who thought the new safeguard would be as effective as the old have expressed disappointment. As was suspected even before 0 licensing came into force, Licensing Authorities are bound to be in some difficulty with an application from a newcomer. If he undertakes to fulfil the requirements of the Act and there is nothing on the record to his discredit—it would be surprising if there was in the case of a genuine newcomer—the Licensing Author ity, whatever his misgivings, might hesitate to deny the right to a foothold in an industry where there is still opportunity and room for initiative.
For some operators the unfortunate consequences are already seen in the number of successful applications. Without probing into the operator's financial standing—as he has a right to do—the Licensing Authority has in many eases warned the operator that failure to measure up to the prescribed standards could result in loss of the licence which nevertheless has been granted.
EVEN the operator who lasts only a year or so on this basis can cause ' serious trouble. A chronic problem for hauliers has been the flood of small operators lacking detailed knowledge of road transport and a proper assessment of the cost. The bankruptcy returns show how frequently the newcomers go to the wall. In the meantime they create difficulties for established operators by cutting rates below an economic level.
Hauliers wonder whether the process will continue and even accelerate when it is no longer possible to confront the applicant directly in the traffic court and force him to produce evidence of need. The new objection procedure is untried. There are doubts of the extent to which it can be effective particularly in dealing with applicants about whom virtually nothing is known either for good or ill.
Hauliers may already be regretting the progressive disappearance of the carriers' licensing system. They may be pleased that it continues to apply to any vehicle with a plated weight of more than 16 tons, thus affording them a continuing and well-tried protection against the incursion of new competition. It may be even better than before_ The applicant has to prove himself twice over on completely different grounds.
Operators with heavier vehicles might prefer this state of affairs to continue indefinitely. In other words they would like the provision for the appointed day for quantity licensing to remain on the Statute Book—so long as the actual day never dawns. They would happily consign to the same limbo the proposed further reduction in the permitted limit on drivers' hours. It would not be revoked but could remain a dead letter.
Could the same thing happen even with the transport manager's licence? It may seem excellent in principle that nobody should be put in charge of vehicles unless he is properly qualified. What becomes more doubtful with the passage of time is whether the qualification ought to be sanctified by law.
EVEN at this stage the operator must realize that the standards now .demanded make it essential for him to choose his manager with care. He will of his own ,accord insist that the manager either has the necessary knowledge or will soon acquire it.
Partly as a result of other provisions in the Act and in other legislation there are more facilities than ever before for the prospective manager to learn his trade. If the new obstacles between the undesirable operator and the vehicles he wishes to operate are not adequate it is useless merely to add to them by insisting on an official or even unofficial test of the manager. The operator will have yet another inducement to find an unauthorized way round the obstacle.
The ranks of the outlaws might even be swelled by those candidates for a transport manager's licence who have not been successful. They would hardly agree that the decision had been fair. The imagined injustice would rankle and provide a motive for circumventing the law in those cases—probably the majority—where the man had no other suitable job to take.
FAILURE to pass the transport manager's test is hardly a qualification for entry into any other trade or profession; and it may not be easy to conceal. The prospective new employer, when he finds that the applicant for a job claims to have worked as a transport manager, may and almost certainly will ask him to produce the licence as proof.
For all the good that it will achieve the transport manager's licence could easily be thrown into the discard where it would join quantity licensing, compulsory tachographs and the 9-hour day. The next Government should have freedom to manoeuvre. It is not bound to tie up all the loose ends left by the Transport Act. What has already been done—although it may seem at first sight merely to have reached an interim stage—could be found from experience to have achieved all that was needed. .