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THE MIDDLE COURSE
Page 76
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ALTHOUGH there are still a few people like Mr. Alex Kitson,
of the Scottish Commercial Motormen's Union, calling loudly or complete renationalization of the road haulage industry and it the other extreme a few entrenched ultra Tories advocating be abolition of all State-owned transport, most people now take up a position somewhere between the two. Where there used to be diametrically opposed opinions there is now an almost infinite series of gradations. It is often difficult to detect where one shades into the next.
From the point of view of hauliers themselves this should be all to the good. Where there is no longer a clash of ideology the political heat dies down. There is more chance that the road transport industry will be judged purely on its merits which is all that that industry has ever demanded.
Evidence that the atmosphere has cleared or is clearing was provided by the participation at the Road Haulage Association's conference this week of both Mr. Stanley Raymond, chairman, British Railways Board, and Sir Reginald Wilson, deputy chairman and managing director, Transport Holding Company.
GOOD PROSPECTS
An interesting variation of opinion came last week from Mr. R. H. Farmer, in his presidential address to the Institute of Transport. He saw good prospects of success in the proposal in the Government's White Paper on transport policy that the commercial interests of the railways and the Holding Company should be merged. Mr. Farmer's one proviso was that the organization thus set up should be flexible with operating units of manageable size and accountability to the lowest practicable level, as is the case with the present subsidiaries of the Holding Company.
In coming to this conclusion, Mr. Farmer was both displaying the courage of his own convictions and obeying the logical consequences of the principle which he laid down at the beginning of his address. Separate entities in transport, he said, organized in units of not too great a size were perfectly capable of working together and in competition for the general good. The question of their ownership therefore, was largely irrelevant.
Skilfully though Mr. Farmer steered this diplomatic middle-of-the-road course, he could not help showing the cloven hoof of free enterprise at one or two points. The danger of merging the two State-owned organizations into one, he said, was that it might find itself for "political or other reasons" unable to achieve the major savings in manpower, buildings and vehicles which must be made if the Holding Company's profits were not to be swamped by the railway losses. The probable actions which "any Government" would then feel obliged to take to bolster up its "ailing child" could hardly be comfortable for the surviving independent operators of goods vehicles.
In the absence of a detailed statement of the Government's intention, Mr. Farmer was not able to take the discussion much further. The matter of controlling a national freight organization, he said, would be of great difficulty. If the purpose was to sell a service to the public the railways would have a relationship to the new organization similar to that between a shipping line and shipping and forwarding agents. Some shipping companies, Mr. Farmer continued, have obtained a stake in road haulage by means of investment. There was nothing to prevent the railways in the same way from having a say in the management of the proposed freight organization.
Equally there need be nothing to prevent a similar participation not only by the Holding Company but also by privately owned road haulage interests, said Mr. Farmer. This lightest possible reference was given a little more substance by Mr. P. H. R. Turner, chairman RHA, in his opening address at the conference. It was evident from what he said that there had already been some discussion, of which it seemed likely Mr. Farmer had been aware, on the formation of a suitable organization to deal with the carriage of parcels and freight sundries.
To the faint-hearted, the proposal may seem like putting one's head in the lion's mouth. At the end of the section on the national freight organization, the White Paper says that interim measures will be taken and that "an early start will be made on the co-ordination of a parcels service of British Road Services with the freight sundries service of the Railways Board". Nothing is said about the independent carriers of parcels and smalls. They are left to work out their own salvation. The idea that this may be done within the very framework to be set up by a Labour Government may well induce a severe attack of claustrophobia in at least a small proportion of hauliers.
A considerable task faces the supporters of the new proposal. Apart from possible opposition within the RHA itself—and even assuming the benevolent support of the railways and Holding Company—there is no telling to what extent the Government would be prepared to modify its own plans. The attitudes of both the railways and the road transport unions towards liner trains is by no means a happy omen.
ENCOURAGING
One possible way may be found in the Ministry of Transport. Mrs. Barbara Castle • has said one or two unkind things about hauliers in the past, but she has not been unwilling to listen to them and to offer assistance. There is a significant and encouraging statement in the White Paper itself. The Government is said to be considering ways in which the efficiency and productivity of the road haulage industry may be improved. "It wishes, too, to link the road haulage industry more effectively with national and regional economic and transport planning," the White Paper adds. The proposals from the hauliers might be said to be in compliance with that wish.
If, after all, the Government is unresponsive, the hauliers can hardly expect much help from the Conservatives, at least on this particular proposal. At the Party conference in Blackpool last week the Shadow Minister of Transport, Mr. Peter Walker, described the plan for a national freight authority as "monstrous". It was a project of nationalization without proper compensation. The Conservatives would fight it both in Parliament and throughout the country.
On the other hand a cold reception from each of the main two political parties might ultimately be the best possible commendation for the scheme. When there are two extreme views, the truth is often found to lie somewhere in the middle.