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'it's better by bus 9
Eldon Griffiths backs new licence proposals
from a special correspondent • Country buses and trains do have a future, Mr Eldon Griffiths, Under-Secretary of State, Department of the Environment, told a special one-day conference of the Rural District Councils Association at the Central Hall, Westminster, on Tuesday, on the future of rural public transport. But he commented that some rural rail services "simply do not make sense" and suggested that the bus was a much better bargain.
Buses cost less to operate, maintain and renew, were more flexible and easier to adjust to an awkward timetable, he said. They cost between 10 and 25p a mile compared to more than £1 a mile to run a 120-seat train". However, Mr Griffiths admitted that bus operators too were having a thin time in many country areas, and also promised that socially necessary rural train services would continue to receive Government subsidies, though these could not be justified "indefinitely".
Apart from the London and South East commuter network, some 200 individual rail services were being grant aided at a cost of £.50m a year, of which £30m was paid by Central Government towards unviable rural rail services alone. Yet the gross sum of grants paid to rural bus services to date under Section 34 of the Transport Act 1968 amounted to no more than Elm, including the Central Government's contribution! Local authorities had to play their part, he stressed, Speaking as someone who really understood the problems faced by public transport, Mr Griffiths made it clear that the proposals to radically alter road service licensing had been made following an intensive study by the Government into the problem, and that it was determined to go ahead on these lines. Quoting the example of his own village, he stated that five different types of bus service passed through each day, such as schools contract, works contract and so on, but none was available to the general public.
Another example given by Mr Griffiths was that of a bus operator who withdrew a licensed service, leaving a village without any buses, Yet when local volunteers arranged a replacement minibus service the operator objected!
Mr Griffiths outlined the ways in which the Government had acted to help public transport in rural areas — rural bus grants; 124p subsidy on every gallon of fuel used by stage buses; doubling of standard bus grants; bus priority lanes; and loans to the National Bus Company amounting to £6m to cover investment in new vehicles and buildings. "Against this background, I totally reject the suggestion that my Department is not helping the hard-pressed rural bus user. We are helping him to the tune of £40m a year", he declared.
As an example of action suggested by the Government, Mr Griffiths revealed that social car service had been introduced by Bridgnorth rural district council for pensioners and disabled people visiting the doctor or relatives in hospital. The local WRVS was organizing the service which would run in parts where there were small but scattered communities and no bus services to supply their needs. The Government had agreed to contribute half of the local authorities' costs for an experimental period, he said. Similar schemes were being considered in Watford, Bag shot (Surrey) and Eltham (Kent).
Taxpayer support
A long contribution from Mr D. W. Glassborow, chief planning and development officer of NBC, explained the position of the company in rural areas to delegates at the conference. Summing up, Mr Glassborow said that if the country wanted a public transport system in rural areas, it would have to support it from the taxpayer or ratepayer.
It was wishful thinking to believe that minibuses, post buses or the removal of licensing would avoid the need for support from the taxpayer, he added. To keep the present level of service going would cost more and more and would not really satisfy those who used the services, he believed.
A more sensible solution would be for them to concentrate on fewer routes giving better services, Mr Glassborow suggested, but there was a need to make the planning of public transport and the planning of public services such as education, health and housing go hand in hand. Public transport planning needed to go beyond the new county boundaries, and he felt that they should use the Traffic Commissioners in a more positive role to ensure that this was done, in partnership with operators and local authorities. Mr Glassborow did not suggest that there were no awkward problems to be solved. The problems of adjustment would locally be very Serious, and that was why he believed that both authority and finance should be available at the local authority level.
Meanwhile, he thought the present use of Section 34 was merely a holding operation, but he had been encouraged by further discussions between NBC and local authorities. He outlined some examples of unreasonable attitudes by local authorities in response to the company's requests for bus service grants, and spoke of the bitterness felt by many NBC employees from management level downwards at the closure of services for which grants had been refused.
Speaking on behalf of British Railways, Mr A. E. T. Griffiths, executive director, passenger, BRB, said that the prospects for rail viability were a "nightmare". BR received a grant of 1.4p for every mile of passengers carried. He denied that rail services had been deliberately killed off.
There were only two ways in which the Post Office could help, said Mr A. Heaton, assistant secretary, Post Office Corporation. One was to use existing rural services to carry mail, and the other was to operate mail buses. Inconvenient timing of existing services ruled out the former practice, and the latter had only limited potential.
Much research had been undertaken into what the Post Office could do in the way of mail bus services, and much disappointment had ensued. Of some 50/60 possible services considered, only four had borne fruit. These were a minibus /mall service in Wales, another in Devon, one in Westmorland and one in South East Scotland. The average number of passengers carried had fallen by 25 per cent with respect to the latter service, he said.
• "Alder Valley" has been chosen as the fleet name for the new NBC subsidiary company arising from the merger of Aldershot and District and Thames Valley. The official title of the company, which commences on January 1 1972, will be Thames Valley and Aldershot Co Ltd. Mr Peter Scully, at present general manager of Aldershot and District, will be the new company's g.m.