I. it can be taken for granted that the Government has not forgotten'
Page 70
If you've noticed an error in this article please click here to report it so we can fix it.
ONE of the more cruel games which adults cart play with a child is to pretend that he is not there and to carry on a normal conversation round and over him. It does not take long for him to begin to doubt his own existence, to kive way to a feeling approaching terror and to welcome an acknowledgement from the outside world in any terms.
Some road transport operators may soon be feeling very much the same if the Government continue so pointedly to ignore their existence. In one way it is a relief that, in keeping with the somewhat guarded references in the Labour Party's election • manifesto, the Queen's speech had nothing to say about road transport—and no more than three words about transport as a Whole. Even this comment •was hidden in a comprehensiVe statement which ranged over housing, the construction industry, a Crown Land Commission and regional planning. If the Government has forgotten about road transport, one would imagine that the operators would be the last people, to wish to remind them.
Unfortunately, it can be taken for granted that the Government has not forgotten. This makes its silence all the more ominous and significant, reminding one of what Sherlock Holmes called the curious incident of the dog in the night-time*. The Government choose to say nothing at the present time because it is waiting until it can tell the whole story. There is not merely the Geddes report to come. There will be plans for controlling the economy nationally and regionally. When the plans mature they will be seen to include transport as merely one item in a complicated pattern.
The various bodies which will have to be set up will be given wide powers. Important appointments will be made, even if it is debatable whether the somewhat rare talents which will be called upon could not be used to better purpose elsewhere. It is within this context that there have been rumours of a transport overlord, possibly a major industrialist such as Dr. Beeching or a leading trade union official.
The effect upon the transport industry could be profound. New bodies and new leaders with authority to organize transport within their own sphere of influence could bring about changes just as sweeping as those which followed nationalization. Against this kind of erosion road operators have prepared little or no defence. They have concentrated upon the possibility of an attempt to take over their businesses and as far as can be seen have to a large extent mobilized public opinion in their favour. If their businesses are lost or curtailed as part of some wider overall scheme they may find difficulty in making their case understood even to themselves.
The danger is particularly acute on the passenger side.
* "Is there any point to which you would wish to draw my attention?"
"To the curious incident of the dog in the night-time." "The dog did nothing in the night-time."
"That was the curious incident," remarked Sherlock Holmes.
Sliver Blaze
The Labour Party is not likely to forget the lesson it learned as a result of the Transport Act of 1947. The area schemes which were expected to take over or control practically the whole of the country's road passenger transport never left the ground. They were stifled by local opposition and were shelved as quietly as possible.
This time the approach is different and will be less easy to defeat. The regional plans will cover the remodelling of existing cities and the building of new towns, the teation of industry and perhaps the distribution of resources. If general approval can be won for the basic plans, transport will be forced to flow into the channels prepared for it. The authorities will appear to have every excuse for supervising the flow all the way through. While the providers of transport may remain for a while under the illusion that they are still controlling their own destinies, they will unexpectedly find their future individual progress cut off by a flanking movement which gathers them safely within the scope of complete national control.
For hauliers the situation could become ironical. They have realized for themselves that there are advantages in voluntary co-operation with each other and with the railways. They have put this concept forward as an alternative to nationalization or to arbitrary restrictions imposed for the benefit of state-owned transport. They believe that by this means they can continue to run their own businesses and their own industry in the way they think best. They may now find that the Government, while not rejecting the idea of co-operation, voluntary or otherwise, will nevertheless take control into their own hands.
The worst policy for road operators would be to take the present official silence as a reprieve and remain equally quiet themselves. They must keep up the debate on ownership and control, even if it seems at times to be more like a monologue. Their ideal of voluntary co-operation within a framework of free enterprise ought to be equally credible and worthy of respect whatever changes take place around them. One of the virtues of road transport has been its ability to fit itself into whatever situation is created or develops and thus save the planners an extra headache--or do them out of a job according to the way one looks at it.
Naturally operators do not pass economic judgrnent on the goods or passengers they are carrying. Theirs is not to reason why.... They may be helping-to depopulate one area and to increase congestion ,in another—but they are unlikely to know this and it is none of their business. What they can claim is that, whenever transport requirements have been made known, they have provided the means to satisfy those requirements efficiently and economically. If this is accepted by the public, as seems to be the case, there is no need to doubt that the same principle will not work in the future. The traffic is the same whether it is generated by individual desires or by Governmsnt decree. The people who have carried it satisfactorily in the past should not be denied the opportunity of carrying it in the future.