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Villiam Birch
HAT could be more auspicious than to be born with a silver spoon in ones mouth? Ask Raymond William Birch. He will probably reply: "To come upon this changing scene with a bus pass in your hand!" Which is pretty Much what happened to him. Certainly, his career seems to have been plainly indicated from the day his birth certificate was marked, "Occupation of father—omnibus proprietor." (He doubts, by the way, whether there is-another like it.) So Raymond—like his forefathers right back to the time when great-grandfather Birch, seeing no bright future in grazing cows in Belgravia, decided to provide coaches and .carriages for the gentry then settling in those parts—has been in transport, one way or another, all his life.
Now, after nearly 20 years with B.E.T., he is chairman of various associated B.E.T. companies such as Potteries Motor Traction, Yorkshire Traction, Yorkshire Woollen District Transport, Hebble and Timpsons, also Eddison Plant, Ltd., which owns a large fleet of road rollers, excavators, compressors and other works contractors' plant, and he is a director of a number of others besides. But if this good-humoured, very human representative of top management ever secretly feels he is getting out of touch with the rank and file—he is really in no danger of it—he can take comfort from his current public service vehicle driver's and conductor's licences and restore self-confidence by placing in that impeccable lapel (which is surely too good ever to be without a morningfresh carnation) the round badge of the bus-crew member.
The more one sees of top industrialists the more obvious it becomes that none got to the top without a pronounced streak of combativeness. Urbane, serene, cynical, detached, knowledgeable in a down-to-earth sort of way-all that no doubt they must be. But if they are not tough they are nowhere. This is not at all the same thing as saying they are all rough-riding trippers-up in dark corridors. It means that they know how to fight mightily.
competitive industry." That appetite for creating a stir is undoubtedly one reason why he has been invited to take a leading part in so many of the transport industry's institutions, associations and committees. He speaks up in no uncertain tones not only for British Electric Traction but for the whole structure of private enterprise as well.
Here, for the assistance of researchers into top management, is a guide to Raymond William Birch outside office hours. In 1942 he was the first national director of the British Omnibus Companies' Public Relations Committee and is now its chairman. All free-enterprise road passenger transport has reason to be grateful for the aggressive, imaginative campaigns waged by this committee. He is also vice-chairman of the Road Operators' Safety Council and at one time or another has been chairman of the Public Transport Association, a vice-president of the Institute of . Transport and president of the Omnibus Society. He is a member of the Committee on Road Safety (Ministry of Transport) and between 1946 and 1952 was a member of the Road .Research Board of the Department of Scientific and Industrial Research.
Enthusiast for Education But that is by no means all. He confesses to a long interest in education. With a twinkling eye he will embark on his educational history. "I am a firm believer in a technical education," he says. "After all, 1 began well. I was at University College, London, where I achieved the distinction of B.Sc.(Eng.) failed. However, I compensated by qualifying, by examination and workshops and manufacturing experience, for membership of the Institution of Mechanical Engineers, and I still think that an engineering background is a good way into the bus industry."
However that may be, he is today chairman of the governors of the North-Western Polytechnic (he has been a governor since 1951) and of the National Committee on Road Transport Education, a position he has held *since 1946. This latter interest is an illuminating sidelight on Mr. Birch's attitude to the industry. He believes in seeing as much of his working staff as possible. So when awards for long-service, safe-driving or educational success are made, he is there as often as possible. It is an attitude of mind that goes a long way to preserve humanity in a business which, by virtue of its vastness, must always be on its guard against loss of the personal touch.
So it comes about that he is profoundly interested in education within the industry. That is why he takes his chairmanship of the N.C.R.T.E. very seriously indeed. This is the body, it will be recalled, which helps the Royal Society of Arts to settle syllabuses of study courses for examinations in road transport.
In the City, Mr. Birch is a respected figure. He has been a Liveryman and Freeman since 1942; and nobody who knows him was surprised when he was recently elected Senior Warden of the Worshipful Company of Carmen.