Two Voices
Page 63
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tied Commentary By JANUS
EVOLUTION seems to be taken seriously by the regions of British Railways. To judge from recent utterances, the men in charge at area level are not Laing independently but are even thinking differently each other. The haulier is puzzled to know what be his reaction when he reads one day that the in Midland Region intend to go all out to win back t traffic that they believe rightfully belongs to rail, le next day that in the Eastern Region there is talk : British Transport Commission co-operating with e operators to secure traffic now carried under flees.
,re is much to make hauliers uneasy in the plans [need by Mr. David Blee, general manager of the m. Midland Region, which carries a third of all a Railways freight traffic, bringing in an annual le of about £110m. The emphasis is on quick results. lee has expressed the belief that it is better to hurry than to risk further loss of traffic while long-term are being made down to the last detail.
:might express train freight services are already eration. There are to be reductions from 170 to a num of 48 in the number of terminals for sundries , and from 1 l 1 to 46 in the number of marshalling An extension is planned.of a door-to-door service already being achieved by direct delivery on railway vehicles from railheads, thus eliminating the delay by the sorting of wagons for onward transit to stations.
en the plans, which arc estimated to cost £25m. over three or four years, begin to take effect, the will find more than one cause for Worry and for laint. There is a direct challenge to his long-distance ties. Next month, for example, the London Midland are to start a regular freight train service, five a week, between London and Glasgow, and are ag to take a 4-ton container for i16.
Public Support service of this kind, if it is run efficiently, must ;ent serious competition to the haulier, and a possible , to the tenure of his licence. The railways would be to object to its renewal in stronger terms than msly, and they would have a good deal of public wt. The idea has never been allowed to remain ant that, for historical reasons that carry great weight country rich in tradition, the railways have a -iptive right to long-distance traffic. If the idea takes n the traffic courts or before the Transport Tribunal, would be great difficulty in eradicating it.
medium-distance haulier may, to some extent, find censing system to his .advantage. In most traffic he has been diligent, or ought to have been diligent, eing that the licences granted for railway-owned es did not allow them to be operated beyond a fairly distance from the local station. For many of their es the London Midland will shortly require a bigger ; and a greater tonnage. Hauliers who can do the should object vigorously and in strength.
;n so, there are well-grounded fears that the new Ly plans will work to the disadvantage of hauliers, ver their range of operation. For the first time the
road operator is beginning to appreciate the effect a the generous treatment of the railways by the Government. The expenditure of £1,500m. on a modernization scheme is going on behind the financial protection afforded by a further £400m. that enables the Commission to show an apparently clean balance sheet even for a year like 1948, when in fact they incurred a loss of £85m. No haulier can run his business on this basis. He must make a profit or perish. Modernization of his fleet is at his own expense, and although he has the roads for his use, such as they are, he pays for them in effect many times over in taxation.
Against this background the desire of the London Midland Region for "quick results" has a sinister appearance. The aim may be not merely to arrest the decline in railway goods traffic, but to eliminate competition while the circumstances are most favourable. The public are already resigned to seeing the £1,500m. loan ultimately translated into a subsidy, and they will feel the same about the £40m., once it has been spent. The railways have an unrepeatable opportunity to cut rates without having to fear the fate that inevitably lies in wait for the haulier who consistently operates below his true costs.
Stroke of Irony It is ironical that the more work a haulier does—and therefore the more fuel tax he is likely to pay—the greater is his contribution to the national revenge surplus from which is financed the modernization of the competitors determined to put him out of business. A further stroke of irony is that, although the Government loan is for railway equipment and vehicles, it frees money for the bigger and better railway road vehicles that may also become a menace to the haulier.
If the haulier takes a gloomy view of developments in the London Midland Region, he may be puzzled by the somewhat different outlook of Mr. G. F. Fiennes, line• traffic manager fGreat Northern) in the Eastern Region. Expressing his own and not necessarily •official opinion, he recently re-stated the Commission's four-fold task in dealing with the railways. The system must be brought up to date, and operated punctually, conveniently, comfortably and cheaply, and rail transport must be sold effectively to the user. But the aim was also 'to contract the system to an economic size."
Hauliers may wonder whether Mr. Fiennes' is a lone voice. They are aware that complaints of startling and even insensate rate-cutting by the railways seem to be most frequent in the Eastern Region, where some operators are saying they must go out of business if there is no improvement. On the other hand, the possibility of co-operation has been suggested from time to time by other representatives of the Commission and of their services.
• At least the opportunity should be created for joint discussion. The Socialists aim to make the Commission solvent by brute force, by suppressing hauliers and ancillary users alike. Mr. Fiennes offers a better solution. If by means of co-operation the professional carriers can provide so good a service that the trader no longer requires his own vehicles, everybody should be pleased.