The Seven Veils
Page 53
If you've noticed an error in this article please click here to report it so we can fix it.
Political Commentary By JANUS
RECENT research has apparently established that Salome 'danced before Herod not for the gory reward that historians have always supposed, but to keep his attention occupied While her friends were easing John the Baptist out of jail, and the gruesome climax was neither her fault nor her wish.
Something of the same high-minded spirit may have animated the Transport Tribunal. Although their recent investigation was mainly to decide whether or not there should be an increase in London fares, the Tribunal cannot:avoid from time to time touching upon general questions. They leave the impression that they regard the vociferous demands for the head of the London Transport Executive on a charger as not only in bad taste, but completely unjustified.
On this basis, the memorandum which accompanied the confirmed charges scheme may be regarded . as a quite passable version in literary terms of the dance of the seven veils. The reader is charmed by a succession of elegant arguments concerning this or that detail of the Executive's finances, until he is half persuaded that the public are misled in keeping up their protests against paying higher fares. It is almost as much of a shock to him as it may have been to the Tribunal to learn that the Executive have been handed over to the ministrations of the Chambers committee of inquiry.
The memorandum of the Tribunal, it must be said, is not without its literary graces. It wasproduced with some show of reluctance, in response, so the Tribunal aver, to the request of the British Transport Commission and several objectors that the main conclusions should be published on some of. the principal issues debated. The Tribunal have not neglected the opportunity that this device provides.. Having decided that, with some small modifications, the Commission's plea for an increase in charges must be granted, they lay about the objectors with great zest.
Prolonged Barrage The sympathy of the reader is secured at the beginning with the straightforward statement that the Tribunal had to consider 28 speeches, the oral evidence of 10 witnesses, 103 statistical tables and graphs, and 17 argumentative memoranda. The figures give a clear hint of a prolonged and exhaustive barrage, and when in due process of time it comes to their turn to say a few words, the Tribunal may be forgiven for exacting a fairly ample revenge for any tedium they may have suffered.
Objectors were not encouraged to stray beyond the limits of the Commission's draft scheme. "We were offered two suggestions, either of which, if accepted, would have relieved us of the necessity of coming to any conclusion whatever on the merits of the scheme." Instead of expressing the gratitude that one might have expected, the Tribunal dismiss the suggestions with contempt.
The first came from the Association of British Chambers of Commerce, who. asked that nothing be done until after a comprehensive inquiry into the whole financial structure and operating policy of the B.T.C. The second, supported by the London County Council and the East and West Ham Corporations, was to try the effect of cheaper fares in the slack periods. Both proposals were set aside as "unworthy of serious examination," and the suggestion from the A.B.C.C. was further criticized as "somewhat irresponsible." In spite of which, it should be noted, the point continues to be pressed, both inside and outside Parliament.
In spite of their discouragement of irrelevancies, the Tribunal express ,surprise that so few suggestions were put forward for making economies in the operation of .London Transport. Specific .suggestions during the inquiry included the abolition of loudspeakers on underground stations, reductions in the number and quality of articles of clothing supplied to drivers and conductors, and curtailment of display advertising in the popular Press.
Devastating Comment
The one witness to whose arguments the Tribunal give any extended consideration was Mr: Stanley Hill, the Middlesex County Council's financial expert, but the memorandum seldom allows him to score. The Tribunal regarded his criticism of the official figures as the only one "deserving of serious consideration "—a devastating oblique comment on the rest, as it is not greatly exaggerating to say that the memorandum depicts Mr. Hill in much the same manner as Gibbon was accustomed to treat any character in Roman history that he did not particularly like.
Mr. Hill is introduced as "enjoying the advantage and suffering the disadvantages of having given evidence at both the previous inquiries." Certain of his estimates are "conservative and illogical," and his asSurriptions without "solid foundation." In his opinion, and " for Want. of a better guide," the Executive's share of the Commission's central charges might be apportioned in .
the same ratio as the net book value of the assets. !' Its
. acceptance as the only permissible method .depended solely on his authority as a financial expert, A. form of support which was at least weakened by the fact that on other occasions he-bad advocated different views." The approach to the problem by Sir Reginald Wilson, representing the Commisiion, "unlike Mr. Hill's, lacked any element of novelty." He offered the result of a series of computations, based partly on fact and partly on guesswork. The Tribunal agreed substantially with his views, although there was not a great deal of difference between his figure and Mr. Hill's.
The memorandum, instead of systematically drawing aside the veils that hide the truth, seems at times to add to the confusion. There seems, for example, no proper criteria for calculating the appropriate figures in respect of the Railway Executive's London lines. "It was common, ground that in order to arrive at any assessment of the working expenses three separate estimates must be made, all of them speculative."
In the end, the Tribunal decided that the London area passenger services as • a whole were failing to pay their way by between £4.8m. and £4.9m. a year,, compared with the Commission's own estimate of £5.6m. The result is the adoption almost in its entirety of the scheme proposed by the Commission. "We are satisfied that the only way by which the London area services can be made self-supporting is by an immediate increase in their charges."
Not many Londoners are prepared to agree.