Transport Fare Increases

Part of the debate – in the House of Commons at 12:00 am on 28 April 1952.

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Photo of Mr James Callaghan Mr James Callaghan , Cardiff South East 12:00, 28 April 1952

In that case, it is difficult to know why we have waited six months for a transport policy, because the party opposite told us before they came to office that they had a policy.

I think the Prime Minister would agree with me that road haulage really became a powerful factor in our economic life as long ago as 1920 and that this problem has developed over 30 years. I believe that in 1947 we hit upon a solution which the party opposite are now going to destroy before it has a chance of establishing itself. The point I want to make—and it is a most important point—is that the delay in publishing the White Paper is causing profound disquiet among a great many transport workers. They want to know where they stand. As one said to me at the weekend, they are looking over their shoulders wondering what is going to happen to them. That is a bad state of affairs.

If we can get from the Government a White Paper which really attempts to solve the problem in the national interest, I am prepared to advise my friends in the industry to wait. That is the important element in this matter. As my right hon. Friend said, none of us is wedded to any particular form of organisation. What we regard as vital is that road and rail should be regarded as partners and not as rivals. In the nationalisation of transport we do not wish to cling to obsolete methods of transport or to shut out the new methods. That is no way to implement a transport policy. But we do say to the Government that the real way in which to ensure that obsolete methods and new methods are worked together is if both are in the same pair of hands, and it is only if road and rail are worked together under public ownership that we can ensure that our transport policy will be commensurate with the needs of the times and of the nation.

The Prime Minister has a dreadful responsibility upon him at the moment in this matter. I hope that he will not, for the sake of a short electoral advantage, issue a White Paper or make any interim settlement which in five years' time he will be sorry to look back on. I regret very much the changes that have taken place. I regret very much that this standstill order has been, in our view, a mere party matter designed to secure an electoral advantage. As such it will fail, and in the fortnight that remains before the White Paper is issued I trust that the Prime Minister will have second thoughts and will look at this transport question in the interests of the nation as a whole.

I beg to move, at the end of the Question, to add: but regrets the vacillation and lack of co-ordination between Ministers which have caused the present confused position and further regrets that in coming to its present decision, the Government has made no proposal for making up the deficit in the Commission's revenue which would be further adversely affected if road haulage were de-nationalised; and accordingly calls for a review of the financial basis of the British Transport Commission, reaffirming the view that the interests of the travelling public and commercial users and those engaged in the industry will be best served by the integration under public ownership of road and rail transport, as provided in the Transport Act, 1947.