NATIONALIZATION SHOULD NOT BE A POLITICAL ISSUE
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QPEAKING at the general meeting of
Ribble Motor Services, Ltd., held this week, Mr. J. S. Wills, M.Inst.T., chairman of the company, said he had. observed with dismay that the subject of nationalization of transport was being made a political issue. The industry has passed successfully through the most gruelling test of all time. It has been short of labour, of fuel, of tyres, and of spare parts, and operators have been unable to replace their fleets, yet essential workers have been transported with remarkable regularity and punctuality. If ever an industry has proved itself to be efficiently organized and fit to serve the public it is the road passenger-transport industry. He thought that if any substantial section of the community had considered nationalization desirable it should have been the subject of an 'open and impartial public inquiry to be adjudged on facts and not settled by political theory. It should have been necessary to prove beyond doubt that the public would derive substantial advantages, which could not be procured in any other way. In the absence of such proof, he added, municipahand company road passenger-transport undertakings should he left to survive and to serve, freed so soon as possible from the war-time, restrictions which prevent them from giving the public what it wants. .