ROAD TRANSPORT MATTERS IN PARLIAMENT.
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Important Legislation Deferred. The Effects of Delay. Driving Tests. The New Penalties for Drunkenness.
By Our Special Parliamentary Correspondent.
A NOTHER session has gone by without any appearLl_ance of the promised road vehicles legislation. It is held up till next session and nobody knows at what (if any) period of the session Colonel Ashley will present his Bill. The Minister of Transport had hoped that his proposals in regard to public-service vehicles might at least have seen the light of day during the recent sittings, but these matters are in the hands of the Prime Minister and the Chief Whip, who are responsible for the course of Parliamentary business. Even the hope that the measure may be introduced at an early date of the next session (which opens on February :2nd) is somewhat damped by the reflection that, if that were the definite intention, there would have been no objection to the Bill being presented within the past few weeks, so that it might be printed for the information of everybody concerned preparatory to its serious progress early in the New Year. colonel Ashley himself appears to be a little despondent, from the tone of some of his replies in the House of Commons.
Effect on Manufacturers' Designs.
AN echo of the feeling of general disappointment felt at these delays was heard in a que.stion which Mr. Penny addressed to. the Minister of Transport, asking him if he was aware that serious difficulty was being experienced by manufacturers of motor omnibuses, chars-k-bancs and goods Vehicles owing to the delay in giving legislative effect to the recommendations made in the year 1922 by the Departmental Committee on the Taxation and Regulation of Road Vehicles in regard to revised weights and speeds of heavy motorcars and to the recommendations made in May, 1925, by the Departmental Committee on the Licensing and Regulation of Public Service Vehicles in regard to the specification of such vehicles, and that the absence of a compulsory order on the subject encouraged the building of unsuitable vehicles and put at a disadvantage manufacturers who had already altered the designs of their vehicles voluntarily to conform with the recommendations, and whether the Minister was prepared to make and issue orders giving effect to those recommendations so far as existing statutory powers would allow.
Colonel Ashley replied :—"I am well aware of the difficulty to which my honourable friend refers, and I_ hope to remedy it by the introduction of legislation. As regards the last part of the question, I would remind the honourable member that the recommendations of the two departmental committees are to be regarded as a whole, and I have always been reluctant to try to give effect to isolated recommendations under my existing powers. Should it unfortunately prove impossible to find Parliamentary time during next session for a comprehensive Road Vehicles Bill, I will carefully consider to what extent I should be prepared and able to give effect to those of the committee's recommendations whicfr do not require legislation."
Test for Drivers of Public-service Vehicles.
OLONEL ASHLEY indicates in reply to a question that in the Bill to be introduced "so soon as possible " powers will be given to require any person who drives a passenger-carrying motor vehicle to have previously passed a driving test such as that passed by drivers of omnibuses in the Metropolitan area. This, of course, is in accordance with the recommendation of the Departmental Committee on the Licensing and Regulation of Public Service Vehicles, which suggested that some standard of qualifications should be laid down, and, inter alia, that jt should be necessary for a driver to show, as and when required by the licensing • B24 authority, by a practical test, that he is able to manage a public-service vehicle of the type he proposes to drive.
Lower Thames Tunnel.
UPON Mr. Looker's inquiry whether a second expert engineering opinion was being obtained by the London Traffic Advisory Board as to the feasibility of a tunnel from Tilbury to Gravesend, Colonel Ashley replied that he was not aware of any circumstances which would make it desirable for him to obtain any further expert opinion at present on the subject of the Lower Thames Tunnel. .
Penalties for Drunken Drivers.
SECTION 40 of the Criminal Justice Act received the Royal Assent on December 22nd. Amongst the terms of the Act are that "any person who is drunk while in charge on any highway or other public place of any mechanically propelled vehicle shall, on summary conviction, be liable in respect of each offence to imprisonment for a period not exceeding four months or to a fine not exceeding £50, or to both such imprisonment and fine."
The Act further makes it clear that a person convicted under this sub-section "shall (without prejudice to the power of the Court, under Section IV of the Motor Car Act, 1903, to order a longer period of disqualification) be disqualified for holding a licence for a period of 12 months from the date of the conviction, and any licence held by him shall, so long as the disqualification continues, be of no effect."
The Court will cause particulars of any such conviction and of the resulting disqualification to be endorsed upon the licence.
Any person who is convicted under this Act and is disqualified for holding a licence is, by the terms of the Act, provided with the opportunity of applying to the Court at any time after the expiration of three months from the date of the conviction for removal of the disqualification or suspension.
Professional and Private Drivers.
THE final form of the penal clause was arrived at after the House of Lords' amendment to the original proposal of the Bill had been taken out of the Bill by the House of Commons and replaced with the more elaborate sub-sections Nos. 2 to 5. The severity of the disqualificatiOn was thus modified by permitting the convicted person to make application for the restitution of his driving licence at any time after the first three months instead of only at the end of any period of three months. In the Commons' debate on the Lords' amendment, Sir F. Meyer took the firmest stand against the new legislation, on the ground that it would deprive drivers of motor lorries, commercial vehicles and passenger vehicles of their livelihood for• a year if they were convicted. He pointed out that a man who drove an engine or worked a crane had not to suffer this additional penalty, and the compulsory nature of It might prevent magistrates from convicting, because it was too severe. Sir H. Cantley took a somewhat similar line, but Mr. Garro Jones was strongly in favour of the new penalty, arguing that the professional driver was in a position to ''do greater damage and cause greater loss of life than a private driver. Captain Hacking, UnderSecretary for Home Affairs, gave the laconic reply that if a man was of drunken habits he should not be allowed to drive a car. The matter was not taken to a division and the clause received the Royal Assent in the terms above outlined.