Another Clear Warning
Page 15
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0 N many occasions we have referred to the possibility of the nationalization of transport. This has, for a long time, been one of the leading matters of policy in the programme of the Labour Party, but lately the Patty, for some reason, has apparently ceased to press this point. Perhaps it was too much against the interests of many thousands of its members. However, we cannot be accused of calling " wolf " without cause, for we now have . some men in the highest positions frankly stating that transport is ripe, or over-ripe, for public ownership and management.
This was actually said by the Secretary of State for Home Affairs, Mr. Herbert Morrison, in a recent speech. He did, however, modify his statement by saying that a case can be made out for private enterprise in appropriate fields.
He said also that " control " sounded restrictive, repressive and damping, but the public method that he visualized must come and, given the right men and methods, could be constructive, enlivening and animating. The State should be represented by officers trained to understand and work with industry, and to know their duty to be to watch the interests of the community. If they had any bias, they should be constunerrather than producer-minded.
One striking comment was that he believed it to be necessary to fuse road and rail transport. It was a serviceable thing to take land transport as a whole and run it as a consolidated concern rWith the railways and road transport each giving its best service. If both road and _rail were merged in a public corporation, we should have a system of road collection and delivery of goods as regular as the collection and delivery of letters.
National Control or Private Enterprise?
All this might appear to be an ideal state Of affairs, but we have already had experience of Government control, as have some other countries, where it has been found necessary to `Make at least a partial return to something like the original private methods.
Where would road transport be.to-day if it had not been for the enterprise, initiative and bard work, over many years, of most of them originally " small " men? Many of them had to fight every inch of the way against the railways on the one hand and official disfavour on the other. It was they who did more than anyone else to provide better service for trade and industry, not only in the matter of the rates • charged, but by giving the latter freedom ofchoice which compared so favourably with the former autocratic manner in which they had been treated.
The chairmen of our main railways have recently expressed themselves as being opposed to complete Government control of their undertakings, and it must be remembered that they have had considerable experience of at least partial control during two long periods.
Personal Element in Road-Transport Road transport is a business into which the personal element enters largely, not only in respect of the relationship between vehicle owners and those who make use of the services provided, but also in respect of the staff, and especially the drivers. In practically no other type of work is a worker entrusted with vehicles and loads often amounting to several thousands of pounds, and who is virtually his own master while -he is on the road.
Quite apart from this, there are so many classes of road transport that they cannot well be lumped together. There are great differences, for instance, between the work of the ancillary operator and that of the general haulier. It may be that Mr. Morrison was thinking more of the latter when he suggested a fusion of road and rail.
Then there is the field of road passenger transport, in which we have the large and well conducted private cohcerns and the important and no less well-run fleets owned by many of the greatest municipalities in the country. Iii every case, the private concern or municipaltransport department is striving constantly to attain a service most suited to local conditions. Would any form of public ownership or nationalization prove more beneficial? •We are strongly of the opinion that it would not.