REGULATION OF RAILWAYS BILL. (Hansard, 27 February 1899)

§ THE PRESIDENT OF THE BOARD OF TRADE: (Mr. C. T. RITCHIE,) Croydon

I beg leave to introduce a Rill to extend and amend the Railway Regulation Acts. The Bill is introduced for the purpose of devising some means by which, if possible, the number of accidents which happen to railway servants in the performance of their duties can be reduced. I am afraid that, whatever we do, a number of accidents amongst railway servants will continue to happen. They are engaged in extremely dangerous operations, and necessarily many accidents must and will continue to occur. But, Sir, if it is possible by legislation or otherwise to take means to reduce the number of accidents I think it is the bounden duty of Parliament to take those means. Now, Sir, the most dangerous of all the operations which railway servants undertake are those in connection with shunting and the coupling and uncoupling of wagons, for this makes it necessary for the ser- 646 vants engaged in these operations to get between the trucks, and therefore many fatal and other accidents are annually occurring. Well, Sir, the attention, of the House of Commons has for the last three or four years been called to this state of things, and the Government have determined to take some steps by which the lives of the men so employed may be safeguarded. [At this stage the right honourable Gentleman's remarks were interrupted for a short space of time by the cries of a gentleman who sat under the Gallery usually reserved for permanent officials of Government Departments, who had been seized with a fit. The sufferer having been carried out of the Chamber by the officers of the House, the right honourable Gentleman resumed.] Sir, the attention of Parliament has been more than once, of late years, called to the desirability of adopting some means by which these accidents might, to some extent, be avoided, and it is not only in this country that attention has been called to these matters. In the United States of America, in 1893, the Congress there passed a law providing that within five years automatic couplings should be provided and fitted to all rolling stock, and thus the necessity for men going between the trucks would be avoided. That term of five years has now been extended two years longer, and in the year 1900, I understand that the whole of the rolling stock in the United States will be furnished with these automatic couplings. They have been found, so far as they have gone, largely to reduce the number of accidents which occur, and so the 647 object of the present Bill is to follow the example which has been set us by our cousins in the United States, and to ask Parliament to give the Board of Trade power at the end of five years to call upon the railway companies of this country to supply the whole of their rolling stock with automatic couplings.

§ THE PRESIDENT OF THE BOARD OF TRADE

Certainly. The Bill provides that no railway company will be allowed, after the expiry of the time, to draw any truck, whether belonging to a private owner or not, which has not automatic couplings. There are one or two other matters of importance dealt with in the Bill. The Measure provides that after two years the Board of Trade can also order steam brakes to be put on all engines. There are a very large number of engines now furnished with steam brakes, but many of them are not so furnished, and as it is quite clear that steam brakes can be applied much more rapidly and much more effectually than any other brake, the Bill provides that they shall be provided. We also provide that hand-brakes shall be supplied to both sides of the trucks, and by that means we render it unnecessary for a man to have to go from one side of a truck to the other. Sir, we also make the same provision with regard to labelling the trucks. We shall make it necessary, after the expiry of two years, that all trucks shall be provided with labels on both sides, which will also render it unnecessary for the railway servant to go from one side of the truck to another. Besides this, we also make a provision with regard to communication between pasengers and the driver and guard. At present the law does not apply unless the train proceeds a distance of over 20 miles without stopping. We shall make the law in future applicable to all trains, however shortly they run, and we shall provide that in two years these passenger communications approved by the Board of Trade shall be applied to all trains. The only other provision in the Bill which I will refer to is a financial one, which will make it easier for the railway companies to incur 648 this necessary expenditure. I think a provision of that kind the House of Commons will think desirable and necessary. I am satisfied, Sir, that if this Act becomes law the railway companies will find, as they have found in the United States, that there will not only be a very large saving in the number of accidents to life and limb, but they will also find that the convenience of moving about their trucks will be so great that they will not desire to revert back to the old system.