A National Scandal
Page 29
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MR. J. S. WILLS, chairman of the Western Welsh Omnibus Co., Ltd., was not exaggerating when, last week, he described the illegal use of small buses as a national scandal. Pirates are turning back the clock to the lawless days before the passing of the Road Traffic Act, 1930. There is, however, a significant difference between those days and the present. Before 1930 competition was free for all. Under, the licensing system legitimate operators are now strictly regulated in their activities, and they are having to fight the pirates with one hand tied behind their backs. They are Unable to take' effective competitive counter-measures and the law fails to protect them.
As Mr. Wills said, it is often most difficult to obtain a conviction, because the passengers and the drivers are in the same conspiracy. Even when a conviction has been secured. there is apt to be misplaced sympathy for the defendants. "Those loudest in their sympathy," Mr. Wills added, "will usually .be those who are the first to • complain if we have to put up our fares or take off a service as a result of this illegal competition."
The magnitude of the problem is seen in an observation which he made near Cardiff City football ground during an association football match last winter. He counted 104 6-12-seaters, few of which were even licensed as public service vehicles. Undoubtedly, most of them were being run as unlicensed fare-taking buses by people who bought them with the deliberate intention of using them to earn untaxed income. They paid no proper licence fees, ignored the Conditions of Fitness Regulations, and flouted the authority of the Traffic Commissioners. It is ironical that this practice should be rife in an area where local authorities, as guardians of. the ratepayers, are more vehemently resistant to legitimate bus-fare increases than anywhere else in the country.
It is hardly surprising that under these conditions 55 per cent, of the routes and 37 per cent. of the mileage of the Western Welsh Omnibus Co., Ltd., should last year have been unremunerative. Most• of the routes were in rural areas. Any recommendation for the alleviation of the difficulties of operating rural services which may he put forward by the Jack Committee will be ineffective unless the police and the Traffic Commissioners make a determined effort to stamp out illegal competition with licensed facilities.