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Let's draw from the Canadian experience

19th November 1987, Page 106
19th November 1987
Page 106
Page 106, 19th November 1987 — Let's draw from the Canadian experience
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Which of the following most accurately describes the problem?

II Twenty years ago just about the sole topic of conversation in road transport was Barbara Castle's White Paper on transport policy.

That gave the first indication that the Transport Bill to be introduced later that year would sweep away the 35-year-old system of A, B and C carriers' licences. Carriers' licensing would be replaced by two parallel systems, euphoniously called "quantity' and "quality" licensing.

The latter, after one Act and one set of Regulations, turned into the now wellestablished 0-licensing system. Not surprisingly, however, the industry's attention was concentrated on the former. For this, with its system of "special authorisations", had the explicit objective of transferring as much freight to rail as was economically possible. The protests were nationwide.

Younger readers may be astonished to learn that their (now) grey-bearded elders even chartered London's Albert Hall for a "Kill the Bill" rally, with Peter Walker and Michael Heseltine as the stars, with the young Lynda Chalker in a supporting role.

In retrospect this concentration on quantity licensing, though understandable, was perhaps a pity. The statutory restrictions would have limited its effect to the margin. And many cynics think that the Ministry of Transport bureaucrats who had to put legislative flesh on the skeleton provided by Mrs Castle, deliberately made that flesh flabby. As a result, they suggest, the scheme would never have worked anyway, but would have collapsed under its own weight.

We shall never know. The effect was to distract attention from the quality licensing system. In a way this was a much greater potential threat to the established haulier. For it made it possible for virtually anyone to enter the industry. LAs' powers to exclude them were negotiable. Even the CPC itself not much of an intellectual barrier did not come along for another 10 years.

With hindsight it might have been better to ensure that the quality licensing system had somewhat higher entry standards and a lower tolerance of bad behaviour by those who allowed those standards to slip.

The current moves to open up the EEC transport market are usually portrayed as a battle between the liberalisers, headed by Britain, on the one hand and the harmonisers, headed by Germany, on the other. This, however, is an over-simplification. For in both camps there are those who argue that the removal of economic regulation notably capacity limitations and rate controls should be accompanied by moves to raise quality controls throughout Europe.

Higher standards on paper are meaningless unless they are applied with some degree of uniformity. The British industry might not object to EEC-imposed higher entry standards as such, but they might suspect that they would be imposed more rigorously here than in well, let us not be specific. Experience with EEC drivers' hours regulations has shown that it is one thing to legislate in Brussels, and quite another to ensure that the legislation is observed in 12 countries over a very wide geographical spread. The considerable difficulties of pursuing offending foreign hauliers, already important, will loom even larger when there is a single European haulage market. Unless something is done there is a real danger that each EEC country's disreputable hauliers will ply their trade outside the country in which their vehicles are registered.

It is, therefore, worth going outside Europe to look at how Canada is tackling the problem. True, it is a Federation, not a collection of independent countries, but its 10 Provinces and two Territories are reluctant to surrender power to Ottawa. So there are many parallels.

Canada had a grandstand view of transport deregulation in the USA. Trucking safety standards have deteriorated since deregulation south of Canada's border, though as usual there is argument about how much, and why.

So Canada eschewed the use of the term "deregulation". This, it thought, gave a false impression. Instead it spoke of "economic regulatory reform", known perhaps unfortunately by the acronym "ERR".

Each Canadian Province has an official known as a Motor Transport Administrator (MTA). Translated into British terms, each MTA combines the roles of Licensing Authority with many of the regulatory functions carried out directly by the Department of Transport. These include driver testing, medical standards, load security, dangerous goods legislation and training, and enforcement.

MTAs' functions are to apply existing law; they are separated as far as possible from the policy side of Government. They meet ,regularly as the Canadian Council of Motor Transport Administrators (CCMTA) to co-ordinate standards and methods. They are introducing, by the end of 1989, a system of exchanging among themselves records of hauliers and drivers. There will be no escaping the law.

Many EEC countries already have an individual, or an organisation, functioning like a Canadian MTA. And there is a case for arguing that, quite apart from imminent European integration, Britain would benefit from such an extension of the tried and tested 'independent LA" system to other fields. In Europe the main need is to remove the very practical topic of control from the politically charged atmosphere of the EEC Council of Ministers, and to place it in the hands of those who know what they are talking about. This already happens on a wide scale in the agricultural field.

A European Council of Motor Transport Administrators might turn into just another layer of bureaucracy. On the other hand, it might ensure that the forthcoming free market does not degenerate into a free-for-all market. Perhaps Brussels should send a team over to see what Canada is up to.

by Keith Vincent


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