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Energy fumbling

26th September 1975
Page 34
Page 34, 26th September 1975 — Energy fumbling
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Which of the following most accurately describes the problem?

SELECT COMMITTEES of MPs are not usually hesitant about telling their colleagues and Government departments what they ought to do. But occasionally they shy away from an issue on which they may find it difficult to assess public opinion, let alone their own.

The committee on science and technology has recently set out its views on energy conservation as a curtain raiser to a Parliamentary debate on the subject. With possibly only one exception, there is no lack of positive recommendations over a wide field, including transport and planning.

The motorist comes in for particularly severe treatment. Test studies "severely restricting private car use" should be made soon in one or two selected cities, says the committee, while refraining from making its own selection. Car pooling arrangements should be encouraged and any legal obstacles removed.

In addition, the report continues remorselessly, fiscal regulations governing the provision of cars by employers to their staff, other than for genuine business use, should be tightened and enforced. The effectiveness of high petrol prices in reducing demand should be reconsidered in view of the extent to which many users are insulated from the full capital and running costs of car ownership.

Older, less well maintained cars, according to the committee, are often the least economical users of fuel. Checks on fuel efficiency, in relation to the age of the car, it is recommended, shouhl be additional to the motor vehicle safety tests.

On commercial road transport it might be expected that the committee would have equally forthright opinions. There is indeed a promising, if not particularly original, beginning. The need to save energy, says the report, is now an additional reason for encouraging the transfer of both passengers and freight to rail or water transport. The committee clearly has no immediate ideas about how this can be done, and contents itself with a proposal merely that the more intensive use of inland waterways and coastal shipping should be "considered.'

Diffidence goes even further with the suggestion that there "may be scope" for the greater use of diesel power, especially in vans; and is stretched to the limit with the bemused reflection that "savings might be made by increasing the maxi mum size and weight of lorries —but environmental considerations may outweigh any potential energy savings."

As there is no specific recommendation on this point, Parliament will not have to consider it, at least at this stage. All the same, the form of words is significant. It seems to put the question of vehicle weights, with inflation, pornography and proportional representation, into the category of the insoluble, or of the hot potato.

Fortunately or unfortunately, it cannot remain there. Successive Transport Ministers have been skilful in keeping the subject in the air in spite of some pressure from Britain's EEC partners, but a compromise decision will have to be made at some time.

Operators may forgive the select committee for its uncharacteristic fumbling. At least the politicians are no longer as confident as they were that an offet to man the barricades at the 32-ton limit would virtually guarantee their apotheosis. Realisation is slowly breaking through that there is no particular magic in the number 32 or any other number. The spells which once kept all concerned within the charmed limit may be losing their power.

For example, it was once argued by Ministers that a weight increase was out of the question because at least £200m —much more at present-day values—would have to be spent on bridges to make them strong enough. Last June, however, in reply to a Parliamentary question, Mr Neil Carmichael, of the Department of the Environment, said that the number of older bridges that might need strengthening to take the weights permitted in other EEC countries, and the cost of doing so, was not known.

From hints of this kind the conclusion may be drawn that the Government, reluctantly or otherwise, may have to make a shift of policy on a matter which has already dragged on for far too long.

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