MERSEYSIDE PASSENGER TRANSPORT BILL (By Order)

Part of Clause 21 – in the House of Commons at 12:00 am on 24 March 1977.

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Photo of Mr Eric Ogden Mr Eric Ogden , Liverpool, West Derby 12:00, 24 March 1977

The hon. Lady is a most determined protagonist of her point of view and has certainly represented the views of her constituents. Perhaps my constituents use the ferries less than her constituents do. Possibly the constituents of my hon. Friends the Members for Bebington and Ellesmere Port and for the Scotland Exchange Division of Liverpool use it slightly more. That, however, is no measure of the concern felt by the district or county councils. After all, these are the Mersey ferries, and they strike a note in our hearts. That is why there is still a lively debate on the matter. I must stress to the hon. Lady, however, that there is no provision in any local authority legislation for two-thirds majorities, and it would be unfortunate if there were.

I am certain that hon. Members will take an interest in the progress of the Bill. I am sure that Mr. Gordon Lindsay, of 25 Howbeck Road, Oxton, Birkenhead, will be interested. He wrote to Members of Parliament on 4th March to ask us to a meeting between him and the Birkenhead History Society at the Liverpool Playhouse, at which an organisation called the Friends of the Ferries was inaugurated. That organisation will want to have its say.

My hon. Friend the Member for Walton passed me a letter from a young man in my constituency, close to his, who wrote: I am the Liverpool schoolboy who has been collecting signatures for a petition to save the Mersey ferries. As you are my representative in Parliament I hope that you will do all in your power to press for a public inquiry when the Bill is discussed in the next week. A further meeting of the Friends of the Ferries will be held at Birkenhead Town Hall on 30th March at 7.30 p.m. Young people will be taking an interest in the future of the ferries. I know well that while this is not a party political matter in the normal sense—and not of the kind we had last night—the Wirral and Walton Labour Parties have made their opinions known clearly to their Members of Parliament by letter, by telegram and by personal meetings.

Early in March Miss Hilary Hodge, the prospective Labour parliamentary candidate for Wallasey, wrote a clear and cogent letter to Merseyside Labour Members in which she said: As you are aware, the Merseyside Transport Executive are promoting a Bill to give them powers to close the Ferries crossing the Mersey from Liverpool to Wallasey and Birkenhead.There is strong feeling about this, especially in Wallasey. More than 3 million trips are being made on those Ferries each year. The Wallasey Labour Party has set up a small Committee … to examine this whole matter and present a case for retention of the Ferries at the Public Inquiry when the MPTE sets it up—with of course an independent Chairman and the proceedings public.We are writing to ask that you do all in your power in Parliament to prevent this Bill's passage until after we have had the Public Inquiry and it has made its findings public.If, after we have presented our evidence and cross-examined the MPTE with regard to the figures adduced to support their case to close the Ferries, and other matters connected with the Ferries, we lose our case—well, that will be that. At least the Labour Party will have shown that it has done all it can to preserve the Ferries. That contact has been continued. My hon. Friend the Member for Garston and I met Miss Hodge together with the leader of the Merseyside County Council at Blackpool last Saturday, and we went over the details provided by the council. The council seemed to make a good case that at the public inquiry it will be one of the groups which will be putting forward strong arguments about means by which viable financial arrangements can be made for saving at least one of the ferries, if not both. But that is something for the public inquiry.

I cannot say that I yield to anyone in my determination that the ferries should remain part of the Mersey scene. I cannot see, from the information available to me, that they can remain part of the transport scene. That will be a matter for the Merseyside County Council after a full and open public inquiry.

The second part of the Bill is no less contentious than the first. In some cases it is even more so. It proposes ways to meet and to reduce the estimated loss of £2 million a year which arises because 15 per cent. of bus passengers avoid paying the proper fares. This has nothing to do with concessionary fares, school passes or pensioners' passes. It is simply the minority of 15 people in 100 who deliberately pay for a shorter journey than they know they intend to travel. That is a common problem in almost any transport authority, but it is greater in Merseyside because we have a higher percentage of one-man buses—about 94 per cent.

My hon. Friends have received the detailed proposals put forward in its statement by the passenger transport executive. It proposed that if a person was found on a public transport bus who had deliberately paid less than he knew ought to be paid, he would be given a choice of paying a £1 fine at the time or of going to court. Because of objections to that, it is proposed to revise Clause 7 of the Bill. Instead of having fines on the bus, it is proposed to ask the traffic commissioners to allow the penalty to be the difference between what the person had paid and the maximum standard fare at any given time. For example, if I pay 20p and I deliberately travel a 40p journey, there is at present no penalty and I merely expect to pay the extra 20p if I were caught. I have nothing to lose by bilking my fellow passengers. Instead of that, it is proposed that if someone is found in those circumstances with no reasonable excuse he would pay the standard fare, which would be linked with the maximum authorised fare at any given time. At the moment it is 56p.

I know that some of my hon. Friends are extremely worried about whether the police will become involved if some foolish person tries to implement this idea at 11 o'clock on a Saturday night at Lime Street. What is the attitude of the unions who will have to operate this'? I am advised that there has been the fullest possible consultation between all those responsible in the executive and those who will have the duty to operate the policy.

There are two groups. In one case there is complete agreement, and in the second case there is almost complete agreement. I have received no objections to these proposals from any of the unions involved. As my hon. Friend the Member for Garston knows, in West Derby we have one of the largest passenger transport depots on Merseyside—the Gillmoss bus depot.