GLC can cut fares
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THE SEE-SAW saga of London Tra lurch last week when three High Greater London Council fares cut i Lord Justice Kerr, sitting with Mr Justice Glidewell and Mr Justice Nolan, ruled that the GLC's balanced plan of re-zoned Underground fares, bus/Underground travel cards, and 10p reductions in bus and Underground fares is legal.
He agreed broadly with the GLC contention that its legal obligation to break even must be balanced against the overall strategic function of transport, and he said that the break-even solution proposed by the Law Lords in 1981 was neither practicable nor the correct answer in law.
"This could only be achieved by cutting down the present ser nsport's fares levels took another Court judges ruled that a £100m siege!.
vice and effectively destroying the transport system of Greater London as we know it," he said.
He said the GLC did have the power to subsidise LT in support of such a scheme as the balanced plan, which will probably be implemented in May, and said it had the power to subsidise anticipated losses.
Unlike the ill-fated Fares Fair scheme, which the Law Lords declared was illegal, the new fares reduction is not part of an election manifesto, but a carefully researched strategy for transport in London as a whole, the Court ruled.
The judgment still leaves many questions unanswered, as the GLC budget is likely to be challenged by at least one Conservative-controlled London borough, and the scheme could fall foul of the Transport Bill's expected cash limits when it becomes law in April.
The Department of Transport was keeping silent about the ruling this week, saying it had to examine it in detail, but word in Westminster suggests that some rethinking of the cash limits will be considered to permit the cuts to go ahead.