PETROL SUPPLIES (UTILITY VEHICLES) (Hansard, 1 December 1948)

§ Sir Jocelyn Lucas (Portsmouth, South)
I beg to move, That an humble Address be presented to His Majesty, praying that the Regulations, dated 11th November, 1948, entitled the Motor Spirit (Amendment) Regulations, 1948 (S.I., 1948, No. 2442) a copy of which was presented on 11th November, be annulled. In moving this Prayer, may I make it quite clear that we entirely support any effort made by His Majesty's Government to defeat the black market in petrol. What we wish to have rectified is the unfair discrimination made against what are known as utility vehicles or shooting brakes. This type of vehicle is extremely popular in these austerity days because of its convenience for shopping and station work and for carrying luggage if sufficient petrol has been saved for a journey by road. These cars pay Purchase Tax as private cars and Road Tax as private cars. Under the new order they are to be classified and licensed as private cars and must use white petrol, but because they are constructed with a door opening to the back for convenience they are classified for speed restriction purposes as commercial vehicles and restricted to 30 miles per hour.

§ Mr. Speaker
Arguments about speed restrictions are out of Order. That matter cannot come under the Ministry of Fuel and Power. It has nothing to do with this order, which merely changes red petrol for white.

§ Sir John Mellor (Sutton Coldfield)
On a point of Order, Mr. Speaker. Is it not in Order for my hon. Friend the Member for South Portsmouth (Sir J. Lucas) to argue that it should be a condition precedent to accepting the order that vehicles which are to be treated as private vehicles for purposes of petrol should also be treated as private vehicles for purposes of the speed limit?

§ Mr. Speaker
I am afraid not. That would be something quite extraneous to the order itself, which is quite a simple one. The speed limit has nothing to do with it. I am afraid that I must be quite firm on that.

§ Sir J. Mellor
May I put the point again? Is it not in order on a Prayer of this kind to argue that before the House is prepared to accept an order, certain things should be done? In this case my hon. Friend is arguing that the provisions of the speed limit with regard to these vehicles should be changed. With great respect, I submit that it is in Order for an hon. Member to argue that there should be a condition precedent before the order is accepted by this House.

§ Mr. Speaker
I am afraid not, because, after all, this is an order by the Ministry of Fuel and Power. Any Prayer about the speed limit is a matter for the Ministry of Transport. Only the Ministry of Fuel and Power can answer on this order, which is their order. The Ministry of Transport does not come into it at all. One cannot make extraneous conditions on an order. One must debate the order on what is in it and nothing else. That is the clear law about Prayers.

§ Sir J. Mellor
With great respect, Mr. Speaker, the Prayer is a Prayer against an order. It does not refer to any particular Ministry, and it is competent for any Minister or his Parliamentary Secretary, on behalf of the Government, to be here to reply. Surely we often have cases where the reply is given on behalf of a Department which is in no way connected with the Minister who made the order? Therefore, in my submission the question is not material as to which 2131 Minister made the order; the material question is which Minister will answer the point that is put forward.

§ Mr. Speaker
That is a very ingenious argument, but I am afraid I cannot accept it. It would be very nice to put down a Prayer to the Ministry of Food and say that we must have the Ministers from other Ministries to answer it. The only Minister who can answer this Prayer is the Minister of Fuel and Power, who is responsible for the order. The Ministry of Transport does not come into it.

§ Mr. C. S. Taylor (Eastbourne)
With the greatest respect, Mr. Speaker, may I point out that by the introduction of this order, which prohibits the use of red petrol in certain vehicles, automatically the speed of those vehicles may be reduced or increased because of the coloured petrol or non-coloured petrol which they are using? If, automatically, a vehicle which has been in the past using white petrol is then permitted to use red petrol under an order, surely the speed limit is automatically reduced to 30 miles per hour, whereas under this order certain vehicles are no longer allowed to use red petrol and have to use white petrol, and therefore it is our submission that the speed limit automatically should be increased from 30 miles per hour to the speed of private vehicles.

§ Mr. Speaker
It is a nice submission, I agree, and it can be put as a question to the Minister of Transport but not made the subject of this Prayer. It is out of Order on this matter.

§ Sir J. Mellor
One point further, Mr. Speaker. Is not the corollary of your Ruling this—and it may have serious consequences in the future—that the only Minister or Parliamentary Secretary who can respond to a Prayer is the one belonging to the Department which has made the order? We shall get to that position, as I understand your Ruling, that no other Minister can reply to a Prayer that has been moved except the Minister who has made the order, or his Parliamentary Secretary.

§ Mr. Speaker
The two subjects are entirely different. After all, whether one uses white petrol or red petrol in one's car is quite a simple proposition. 2132 Whether one is limited to 30 miles per hour or not is another simple proposition. I confess that I have one car under this category myself, but it does not worry me in the least.

§ Mr. C. S. Taylor
If I may respectfully point out, Sir, the car in which you have the red petrol, is restricted to a 30 miles per hour limit, and the car for which you have the white petrol is not restricted to a 30 mile per hour limit. Therefore, under this order, the colour of the petrol affects the speed of the motor vehicle.

§ Mr. Speaker
Not a bit. Who knows what is the colour of the petrol inside the car? I am afraid I must Rule out of Order on this Prayer the question of the speed limit.

§ Sir J. Lucas
On a point of Order, Mr. Speaker, is it not in Order to ask to postpone this regulation until this discrimination and this unjustice has been righted?

§ Mr. Speaker
The order itself is under a time-table which comes to an end after 40 days. It cannot be postponed by law beyond that period. I think the hon. Baronet must take other means of raising the question of the speed limit. This is not the right way.

§ Mr. C. S. Taylor (Eastbourne)
I beg to second the Motion.
There is no fog tonight, so I hope the Government will not see fit to move the Closure too early. Without referring to the speed limit, I suggest to the Government that the withdrawal of red petrol from the types of vehicle under discussion—the utility vans, the shooting brakes, the farm vehicles, the kind of vehicles which people use for dual purposes, either for carrying passengers or for carrying goods—is penalising a large number of honest people for the sake of preventing the use of red petrol by a small number of dishonest ones. I submit that the Government cannot have this both ways. Either they say to the owner of one of these utility vehicles, "You are the genuine user of a vehicle of this description and, therefore, will be entitled to red petrol;" or else—without mentioning the speed limit, Sir—I suggest they should say, "Your vehicle will be treated in every respect as a private vehicle."
2133 We have all seen private cars being used for business purposes. We have all seen these little saloon cars with a series of coathangers at the back, with ladies' dresses and men's clothes hanging from them, and a man in front with his homberg hat on, driving. They are used entirely for business purposes when the coathangers are in the back and are used for private purposes when the coathangers are removed. They are subject to no restrictions such as are imposed upon the vehicles without side windows and back doors which we have under discussion tonight.
I would mention one other point—namely, these utility cars, shooting brakes and vehicles of that type, have found considerable favour with purchasers from abroad, especially Americans. Many Americans have purchased these vehicles and have driven them during their visit to this country, and they are accustomed to driving these cars without the restrictions that are imposed in this country on trade vehicles. It is absurd to make any discrimination between vehicles because of the kind of body the vehicle has on it; it is a question of the use to which a vehicle is put. I suggest that the Government should be prepared to withdraw this order, reconsider it, iron out the obvious anomalies which my hon. Friend did his best to point out, and come back to the House with a different order.

§ Mr. Paget (Northampton)
There seems to he one further difficulty. It seems to me to be one which cannot be remedied by regulations but only by amending the Statute, since it turns upon a Section of the Statute as interpreted by the court in the case of Hubbard and Messenger. On the other hand, if manufacturers like to look at the case of Hubbard and Messenger, they can find an easy way of getting out of the difficulty for themselves.

§ Sir J. Mellor
Before the Parliamentary Secretary replies, may I make one point? I understand that these vehicles, being very largely used by farmers, are, in their case, largely supplied with commercial petrol purchased in bulk at a reduced price. If farmers are compelled by this order to use white petrol, they will have to pay the full retail price for that petrol and will suffer a substantial loss by being deprived of their previous advantage of 2134 being able to buy commercial petrol in bulk at a reduced rate. I shall be glad if the Parliamentary Secretary will deal with that point.

§ The Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Fuel and Power (Mr. Robens)
I take it that generally in the House there is really no one who wants to vote against this order. It has really been a method of bringing in some other matters which probably will be raised in another way at another time. Therefore, I will not delay the House with a long explanation of this regulation, because it is so well known. I think everyone in the House will agree that we must take every step possible to avoid improper use of petrol supplies. The more we can save from improper use, the better it is for the honest and decent motorists who are the bulk of the motorists in this country. We appreciate all the help that we have had from motorists, and from the motoring associations and garage proprietors who have assisted the Department nobly in stamping out the improper use of petrol.
I gave an indication some time ago at a Press conference of a very large number of conversions taking place, and the large number of utility vehicles on the roads because this gave them an opening into the red petrol black market. I would like to repeat those figures tonight. In August-September, 1947, there were 16,450 vehicles, with utilities numbering 683, and conversions numbering 285. Twelve months later, in August-September, 1948, the number of vehicles of that type had risen to 23,827—these are applications for "C" licences and not total vehicles on the road at that time—and of those, utilities numbered 2,521 and conversions 4,661. Therefore the conversions had risen from 285 to 4,661.
I thought the House would be interested tonight to see what has been the effect of this regulation already in respect of conversions and utilities. I am sorry that, because of the obviously short notice, it has not been possible to get the figures for the country as a whole; but I think the figures for the three regions I have will be interesting. In Yorkshire the figure for "C" licences issued for the last two weeks in October, 1948, for both classes of vehicles, utilities 2135 and conversions, was 258, with 124 utilities and 134 conversions. For the last 14 days of November, the total number of applications was 53–17 utilities and 36 conversions. In the eastern region in the last two weeks of October, there were 86 licences issued for this type of vehicle, consisting of 14 utilities and 72 conversions. For the last 14 days of November, they had dropped to 29 vehicles, consisting of seven utilities and 22 conversions. In the north-western region, the number of licences issued for the last two weeks of October, 1948, was 310, consisting of 130 utilities and 180 conversions. For the last 14 days of November, 1948, applications numbered 26, consisting of one utility and 25 conversions.
I think that those figures in themselves show that this regulation has been of great benefit, and ultimately I hope that we shall be able to show, in relation to petrol consumption, the figures of actual overall saving. We have not attempted in this regulation to cut down the supply to the fair motorist, to the farmer or anyone else who now has to change to white petrol. When a proper application has been made, we shall see that, if petrol has been granted before, the proper amount in red petrol will be given in white petrol, except for this one condition, that in the case of those who converted their cars and therefore took their files away from our regional petroleum office to the district transport officer of the Ministry of Transport, when we get an application to the regional petroleum officer we shall compare what they were obtaining before, and in, all probability, having weighed all the facts of each case, if they happen to have had more from the Ministry of Transport we shall cut their supplies down to what they had before the conversion.
I hope the House will not vote for this Prayer and will agree that it is a good regulation which Members of all parties should support.

§ Mr. C. S. Taylor
Before the Parliamentary Secretary sits down, will he deal with the question of some of the restrictions? Will he deal with the speed limit?

§ Mr. Robens
I cannot speak about the speed limit, but so far as other alleged anomalies are concerned, I will say that we agree that it may be that the farmer may find a slight difficulty because he has to deal with two sorts of petrol, but I can tell the House that the National Farmers Union have co-operated with us on the point and they are agreed now that they understand the purpose of the arrangements and are assured that farmers will not be prevented from doing their jobs.

§ Mr. Baldwin (Leominster)
May I point out to the Parliamentary Secretary that the effect of his not being generous in assisting the farmer to use his light car to go from farm to farm will result in his using a larger vehicle and consuming more petrol? He may well use a two-ton lorry, because he will do the job somehow and, instead of there being a saving of petrol, more petrol will be wasted.

§ Sir J. Lucas
May I ask one more question? I have promised not to mention the words "speed limit" again, but I hope the Parliamentary Secretary appreciates that, in many parts of the country, regulations differ in their interpretation by the police. In some parts one finds that there are no prosecutions except for dangerous driving, and certain other offences which I must not mention, while the position is different elsewhere. Could not the hon. Gentleman give a hint to the police to use some discretion in this matter?

§ Mr. Robens
The hon. Member will require to take up that matter with my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary.

§ Sir J. Lucas
I beg to ask leave to withdraw the Motion.