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matters by John Darker, AMBIM
Don't forget the dustmen
ONE of the least publicized consequences of the local government reorganization now decided upon is the effect on transport services. Judging by comments made by those attending the recent annual meeting of the Association of Municipal Transport Officers, there has been little forward planning or even serious thinking about the transport aspects of larger authorities. It would not be at all surprising if the problems are looked at when, and only when, the new authorities are fully staffed.
This situation is worrying to most municipal transport managers. One or two of the senior members of the Association have built up such good relationships with other public officials and elected councillors that the transport function will not be neglected in any conceivable reorganization but most members faced the future with foreboding. They realized that delayed decisions on things like vehicle replacement policies, location of transport headquarters, staff training facilities, maintenance provisions, etc, would prove costly in the long run.
I was surprised to learn that though most members of the Association are also members of the local government trade union, NALGO, transport managers find their administrative colleagues distinctly unhelpful in many respects. On pay, NALGO seems to do far too little for transport employees. County library authorities expect to hire drivers for library vans, for example, at a ludicrously low pay. Some transport officers in southwestern counties were said to earn less than dustmen. There was general regret that the Transport Managers Licence provisions had not been activated. Several people hinted that TMLs would have provided municipal transport managers with the higher status and authority they so obviously need.
Severely restricted It appeared that in some counties no qualified men were employed in the transport function until TMLs were talked about but at present, regardless of the qualifications and experience of senior transport staff, the terms of reference, and capacity of transport executives to innovate were severely restricted. Some speakers said there could well be no competent transport executive when the new large authorities are formed.
The Baines Report on the management structures needed for the larger local government authorities was heavily criticized by a number of speakers for its virtual neglect of transport. One County Transport Officer, with much experience of previous local government reorganizations, quoted a Roman administrator in 65 AD. "Reorganization will give the illusion of progress while creating chaos." The new proposals were pure political chicanery, he believed. So far as transport was concerned a golden chance to reorganize was being thrown away. Despite the Sharpe Report: "Transport Planning — the Men for the Job" published a few years ago, with its stress on the need for a multi-disciplinary approach to problem solving, routine problems of transport operation were still being neglected in official thinking. Transport managers — surely the kingpins in operating freight, refuse disposal, passenger and ancillary services efficiently — were playing little part in the major reorganization now in hand.
In various parts of the country efforts have been made to make the best of a confused situation by setting up working parties of officials, including transport executives, to try to work out a sensible pattern of organization. Unfortunately, in the jockeying for position that is now exercizing the senior officials in local government, key members of a working party may be transferred, promoted or demoted. If the principal functionaries of the new authorities were known, subordinate officers concerned withtransport could make a concerted approach and hope to devise a sensible plan to be activated smoothly on "D" day (April 1 1974 England and Wales, April 1 1975 Scotland).
Since the names and indeed titles of the new top officials are not yet known another approach suggested by speakers was to contact prominent councillors, the sort of people who — given election — would wield power in the new authorities, so that the need for a transport strategy could be recognized in time.
Transport officers from London boroughs have been through the traumatic experience of reorganization before and they were quick to remind provincial colleagues of the kind of thing that couk happen. One said he was told he was tc be the borough transport manage on the day of reorganization in 1965 He was presented with a bundle of 101 books and given no clue as to th whereabouts or condition of the vehicles. Over seven years after the establishmen of the Greater London Council it appear that some borough transport pattern leave much to be desired. Said one critic "A new sewer across our territory divide us from other colleagues operatin vehicles almost as effectively as does th Berlin Wall!"
Vehicle maintenance It was apparent to an observer at thi Association meeting that many authoritie particularly in remote areas of the country have made a poor fist of vehicle main tenance in the past few years. There wer references to vehicles and plant bein garaged in a wide variety of scattere places — including farmyards — service and maintained for the most part b handymen or drivers in unsuitabl premises, or at local garages when necess ary, "usually by unenthusiastic personne not very conversant with some of th specialist types of vehicle used by loci authorities".
Standardization in any form is regarde as a Utopian concept in one West Country region. Each separate authority makes its own choice of vehicles, plant, oils, grease maintenance methods, purchase renewals, costing or other records. Even legal requirements were sometimes blatantly flouted where the arm of the law was seldom seen.
Because of the obvious major reorganization of transport by, or before, April 1974 when the Local Government Act is implemented, officers have a splendid excuse for deferring action on peripheral matters such as bonus schemes for drivers or time-studied cleansing operations. If, as may be anticipated, the larger authorities are expected to improve the public services which are now deficient by the best standards — such as refuse collection which may vary from weekly to three-weekly collections — the case for early planning of staffing, plant and vehicle requirements is powerful.
In one village in the West Country, with 350 inhabitants, a fortnightly refuse collection is liable to be missed and householders are wise — according to this authority's transport 'officer — to "drop in at the local, when the dustmen are there, and buy cider all round..."
With well-engineered refuse cleansing vehicles on the market it seemed strange to hear one delegate describe some of the makeshift equipment used, such as open wagons and farm tractors and trailers — enough to give a professional cleansing officer a touch of apoplexy. Waste compaction and transfer loading techniques were just as applicable in rural areas as in towns, in the view of some responsible transport officers.
Escalating costs Although administrative reorgan ization does not provide the best climate for innovation, rapidly escalating costs combined with increasingly demanding consumers should act as a spur to innovation, experiment, and the running of pilot schemes.
Mr John Denman, who read an interesting paper "Where does transport belong" at the agm, startled his colleagues when he speculated on "suitably built vehicles carrying passengers pulling a trailer of compacted refuse, engineering equipment or even needed merchandise to outlying districts". However crazy this sounded, said Mr Denman bravely, municipal transport engineers "must be men of vision and adaptability, ready to move something, somewhere, somehow. Transport is the lifeline of our communities and its controller must be an entrepreneur par excellence".
I fear that ratepayers may not look kindly on entrepreneurial municipal transport managers though it may well prove to be in their ultimate interests that risks should be taken with their money. In all branches of transport "the mixture as before" must yield to new ideas promoted by enthusiastic professionals. The contribution that can be made by professional enthusiasts is another story