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Labour MPs slam luantity licensing
Page 45
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Mr. Richard Marsh, newly appointed Minister if Transport, joined the Commons Committee al the Transport Bill last week for the first ime, to hear several Labour MPs voice concern 1 plans fo'r quantity licensing. The plan for leavy goods vehicles over 16 tons to require pecial authorization for journeys over 100 niles came in for sharp criticism and was still rider discussion when MPs adjourned for Easter. Welcoming the new Minister to the Committee, An Peter Walker, the Conservative spokesman oointed out that Labour MPs were deeply livided on the proposal. He could understand he Government's original thinking in trying o find a way of quickly moving traffic from road o rail and bolstering what they considered were he improved services of the railways. But when came to the detail of what this meant in iractice the real problems could be seen.
For example, if vehicles of up to 16 tons ?ere completely free from licensing, this would lot create movement to rail, but from 32onners to 16-tormers. The 32-tomier was a ensible vehicle to use; to force people to use 6-tonners could not be a right principle.
A series of amendments intended to provide xemptions from the quantity licensing were efeated, including suggestions that the system hould not apply to Scotland, Ireland or the Levelopment areas; to the carriage of fish, house[old removals, perishable goods, timber, milk, Austria] wastes, paper, pulp, or to a vehicle censed to a person for carriage of goods conected with his trade or business.
But it was announced by Dr. Dickson Mabon, 4inister of State, Scottish office, that the 4inister intended to exempt from quantity censing all international roll-on/roll-off raffle.
Mr. Peter Doig (Labour, Dundee West) said le was not prepared to support the Government )n quantity licensing. His union—the Transport ind General Workers—was completely opposed o it. The question of opportunities for return pads was most important.
Transport operators calculated costs on a $.asis of 75 per cent return loads. Under the lovernment system, the chances of return pads were considerably decreased; this was pound to increase costs.
The 100-mile limit, he said, would also have detrimental effect on the Government's general ■ olicy of trying to attract and keep industries a development areas.
It was said that many of the special uthorizations would go through "on the od". This was all very well if the same load ras being run from A to B, day after day, week .fter week, but there were many cases when one id not know a long time in advance what one rould be carrying, or where.
The idea that an application could go irough "on the nod" was rubbish, he declared. Iritish Railways had to have time to consider n objection, and even if they did not object le time lapse might be enough to lose the order. ome 40 per cent of freight traffic was now being arried by road over 100 miles. If it was true iat British Railways and the Freightliner serices were so efficient, why, in the name of goodness, could they not leave BR to compete for the business and to improve their efficiency?
He thought that there was a good deal in what had been said by Conservative MPs that what was really needed was not controls of the kind proposed, but a shake-up in the sales staff of British Railways to make them go out after business and work on a commercial basis. In this way, a great deal of hardship and trouble could be avoided.
Mr. Doig concluded by pointing out that a lorry driver when he set out seldom knew how many miles he had to go. Suppose one set off without special authorization? Were we getting back to legislation whereby dishonest people got away with it, while honest people were hindered?
Mr. Edward M. Taylor (Conservative, Glasgow, Cathcart) congratulated Mr. Doig on his stand against the proposal. His wise words had been a devastating blowiag-up of all the arguments for the licensing system.
Another Labour member, Mr. Leslie Huckfield (Nuneaton) said he had reservations about the proposal. He was concerned to know how generous the.. special authorization would be; if there was to be blanket authorization, there was not much point in having the procedure at all.
As a driver, he had always been keen on back loads, and regarded it as his duty to get a back load wherever he could. Part of a driver's skill was that which enabled him to know his clearing houses, BRS depots and other places where he could get back loads. All that was threatened by the clause.
Some of the tributes to the Freightliner service between London and Glasgow had been too glowing; it was so overbooked at present that frequently it was impossible to get on it.
Goods put into Tufnell Green depot could not be carried without three days' notice. That, he said, was hardly the flexibility which it was designed to bring about. Road haulage was essential and the proposal would seriously damage the unique service which a road haulier could provide.
Mr. Ted Leadbitter (Labour, Hartlepools) suggested that the clause was perhaps the most important in the Bill relating to road haulage. He did not want to get into an argument for or against road haulage or rail. The duty of the Committee, he declared, was to ask: What was best in the interests of industry as a whole, and how best could the job be carried out without imposing on it a bureaucratic machine which would create irritation and possibly delays and lead to increasing costs?
The more he looked at it, the more he became troubled about how the proposal would deal with the 100,000 vehicles included in the special licensing. Goods vehicles of up to 16 tons would be exempt from any quantity control and free to undertake any kind of work. What conclusion would be drawn by people who owned and used those 100,000 vehicles over the limit? The natural intuition would be to get within the limits.
The Parliamentary Secretary for Transport has stated that there was a good deal of flexibility in the provisions. But an assurance of flexibility meant nothing to Mr. L,eadbitter. What was flexible to him was not flexible to a civil servant. He could not support the clause and suggested that the Government should have the courage and wisdom to reconsider It.
Mr. James Bennett (Labour, Glasgow, Bridgeton) also voiced concern against the proposal. He was not satisfied that it would do what the Minister intended; he and the other Labour MPs were not concerned with doctrinaire principles, but with providing the right type of transport for the nation.
Dr. Mabon stressed to the Committee and particularly to his backbenchers who had genuine doubts and fears, that the Government intended to introduce regulations following the Bill. Once something was in a Statute, it could only be changed by a Statute; whereas regulations could be changed. It would be absurd to lay down in the Bill all the regulations and exceptions which would flow from the quantity licensing clause.
It had to be realized, he declared, that the railways had taken a beating financially and psychologically in industry's eyes for a long time. Now that they were being streamlined and modernized, they had to be given a fair chance to make an assessment of their prospects and see whether they were on equal terms with road haulage. If they were not as good as road haulage, then the road system would succeed.
Dealing with the Conservative proposal that own-account operators should be entirely free from licensing, Mr. Swingler said the Government was anxious not to treat them in any different way from professional hauliers.
Once it was accepted that there should be a system for transferring traffic off the roads, it was as much in the national interest that the system should apply to own-account operators as to professional hauliers. But the Government wanted to achieve as much as possible by negotiation.
It wanted everyone to consider how far they could co-operate in the transfer of traffic to the railways which it was efficient and economically desirable to transfer.
The exemption had been proposed by the Conservatives, he said, simply and solely because they were opposed to quantity licensing as such.
The Government had decided to simplify the licensing system. Some 900,000 out of the l+rn vehicles in the road haulage business would be totally exempt. Out of the lim, 600,000 would be subject to quality control, and less than 100,000 subject to quantity control. This had to be compared, said Mr. Swingler, to the 190,000 vehicles subject to quantity control under the present system—which the Conservatives had done nothing to abolish.
Explaining the exemption for international roll-on/roll-off traffic, Mr. Swingler said this would apply to the vehicle carrying the load, whether or not the propulsion unit went with it. But if the container was taken off the vehicle, the exemption would not apply. The exemption would also apply to journeys to Northern Ireland or anywhere else divided from Britain by a stretch of sea.
A bitter row between members of the Committee blew up when Mr. David Mitchell (Cons, Basingstoke) complained of a high pilferage rate with nationalized transport, naming British Railways and British Road Services. Labour MPs protested repeatedly at his allegation against employees of the two services.
Eventually Mr. Mitchell regretted his impression that railwaymen or employees of any nationalized industry were dishonest, and withdrew his remark.