Phoenix Too Frequent
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F., VERY Minister of Transport since the war has had a Transport Bill to himself, like the phoenix that
lays but one egg and is then translated to another sphere. The damp and lukewarm welcome given to the new Transport (Disposal of Road Haulage Property) Bill may be due partly to the irony of the title and partly to the fact that it was stilt damp from the press when the Minister responsible for it took another job and left Mr. Harold Watkinson to play the part of foster father.
Another reason for the quality of the reception is the feeling that this Bill is not the last. The next Transport Bill may conceivably be a Socialist measure turning the screw in •a direction hardly yet imaginable. The Socialists will certainly take the opportunity to put in amendments to the new Bill, some serious and others derisory. Although most of the amendments will be rejected, the Socialists will not vote against the Bill, which is from their point of view a good deal better than nothing at all.
It is improbable that they will accept the Bill as a suitable political compromise. Their willingness to do so, if it existed, would be the main justification for a measure that has no positive policy behind it hut merely applies the brake at an arbitrarily chosen point on the journey away from nationalization and back to free enterprise. An all-party agreement would indeed bring a new spirit with the New Year. There are no signs of the new spirit at present. The frame of mind of most of the interests affected can best be described as peevish.
Braved the Wrath
The Government must be disgruntled that their 1953
Act has had to undergo an operation. The backbenchers have braved the wrath of the Cabinet, but the warmth of their protests is not likely to last long in the cold statistical atmospheres of the lobbies. The late Minister of Transport should be pleased at qualifying as a pheenix, but he may feel that in his case the egg is a very little one and even slightly addled. An unusual circumstance is that the terms of the Bill have become generally known well in advance, even down to the actual figure of 7,750 general haulage vehicles, which seems to have acquired almost magical properties through repetition. What the new Minister thinks about the Bill he has inherited remains to be seen.
Best known of all are the views of the hauliers. whose opposition has hardened with the increasing certainty that the Government ate determined-to have their own way. Some queasiness about the ability of prospective purchasers to find enough money for all the vehicles and other property has been settled by the obvious prospect that there will be no chance to buy. Hauliers can wear the martyr's crown with impunity. They have, been misled, to use no stronger word, and they are entitled to make their protest as loud as they please.
The Socialists come out of it perhaps best of all. They can enjoy themselves sniping at pretty nearly everyone, including the Government and the hauliers. They can legitimately feel the macabre pleasure of the prophet whose forecast comes true, although no doubt they will, for the sake of appearances, assume suitably lugubrious expressions over the carcass of British transport butchered to make a politician's holiday. Trade and industry have a more ambiguous outlook. It is evident from statements that .have been made recently that they no longer know what, they want. At one time, the traders certainly did not want British Road Services. Then some of them took fright at the upheaval of denationalization, and saw in B.R.S. merits that were previously invisible. But the same people can also see the danger of a tyranny exercised over them by the British Transport Commission, particularly if and when the railways get the approval of the Transport Tribunal for their goods charges scheme.
No mention whatever is made of the railways in the new Bill. The railways themselves are 'pleading poverty and complaining at the loss of traffic to road. Their plans for development and for greater rate flexibility, however, hold a menace for their haulier competitors, and at the same time make their customers feel uneasy and suspicious. The attitude of the traders towards the new Bill is one bordering on schizophrenia. Within a short time the transport world, as they know it, may lie in fragments. In their uncertainty, they are inclined to attack the Commission, the hauliers and the Government
Shackle the Hauliers
The Commission should be enjoying themselves most of all. In their capacity of British Railways they have, or will have before long, the freedom that even the Socialists denied 'them, preferring to expropriate or shackle the hauliers. As road hauliers, the Commission will command a fleet of vehicles that still have plenty of weight to throw about, 42,080 tons in the precise arithmetic of the new Bill Evidence that this weight will be used shrewdly in the places where it can have most effect is provided by the substantial applications for extra vehicles that are already being made by B.R.S. in some traffic areas. They are setting some of the hardest licensing conundrums for a long time. B.R.S. can always create an artificial scarcity of transport in one district by moving all their vehicles to another. Buyers of transport units add to the confusion by taking their prizes away, regardless of the needs of the customers whom the vehicles formerly served.
Hauliers in the Road Haulage Association are alive to the danger, and have already taken joint action to object in a number of cases. They have had some success, although the decisions in their favour may yet be tested on appeal. Another case, involving an application for 15 vehicles at Sheerness, is due for further hearing today.
Licensing may hold the clue to the future. When B.R.S. were first set up, they .did not require to hold licences. With no restrictions on expansion, they seem to have, made little' effort to expand. The fleet of 36,000 vehicles with which they were credited at the time of the passing of the 1953 Act was much less than the number acquired from hauliers. Under the new Bill, B.R.S. will be allowed to keep at least 9,000 vehicles, as well as those on contract. The policy appears to be to increase the total without delay. If thwarted in one direction. B.R.S. will no doubt try another, and their rivals will have to keep a constant watch on their activities.
At least, there should be an interesting yearahead.