ROAD MAINTENANCE CUTS (Hansard, 11 February 1948)

§ Sir Wavell Wakefield (St. Marylebone)
I desire to draw the attention of the Government to the maintenance of roads, as outlined in paragraph 68 of the Government's White Paper on Capital Investment in 1948. As the Government's proposal for maintenance on roads is set out in this paragraph, it will be for the convenience of the House if I ran through it. I am going to draw attention to what I believe to be a wrong policy on the part of the Government, a policy which is not in accordance with the national interest. Before the war the expenditure on maintenance of roads was at the rate of approximately £42,000,000 a year. The present rate is £55 million, which, owing to increased prices, means only about, three-quarters of the amount of work done in prewar years. A comparable figure is £70 million. The Government in this paragraph say: It had been intended that war-time arrears should be made good as quickly as practicable so that additional expense and increased quantities of materials would not be required later. At present the local authorities have about 90,000 men engaged on road works, of whom some 51,000 are employed by the county councils—mainly on rural roads. In view of the need for additional labour for agriculture, rural housing and other essential work, the Government has decided that the amount of road maintenance to be carried out next year should be reduced so as to release some 20,000 men 530 (i.e., rather less than one-quarter of the present labour force). This is a grave situation which we are facing at the present time, but instead of increasing the labour force to repair the bad state of our roads we are going to have a reduction of 20,000 men. I consider that that reduction in the maintenance of roads is very serious, because road transport is the lifeblood of industry and of agriculture. If roads are not properly maintained, food production, about which we have heard tonight, must be adversely affected, as must the industrial production which the Government are so anxious to have stepped up both for export and internal needs.
What is the present position of our roads? Here I will quote what the Minister of Transport himself said on 6th May, 1946—less than two years ago—when he announced a ten years' programme. He spoke about the first stage which was to cover about two years, and we are in that period now. He said that in the first stage attention must be given to the overtaking of large arrears of road maintenance accummulated during the war and to the repair of the serious damage in certain areas consequent upon tank training and similar military activities. That serious position of the roads is borne out by information I have obtained from highway authorities and county surveyors and others whose duty it is to see that our roads are kept in a proper state of repair.
I will quote two statements which show the serious position in which our 531 roads, particularly the country roads, now are as a result of war circumstances and of the new cuts which make it impossible to maintain the roads as they ought to be kept. One letter says that during the past ten years the loads which these country roads have been required to carry have increased at least five-fold with the intensive mechanisation of agriculture, and today they are carrying a burden which they were never designed to carry. The letter goes on to say that once the labour force is reduced below the minimum at which it stands today—and that, I would point out, is without this cut of 20,000—these roads will become dangerous and the traffic on them will of necessity cease. Without adequate roads, fertilisers cannot be brought up to the farms, combines cannot reach them, and neither crops nor stock can be sent to the markets.
The letter adds that in a short time the agricultural life of the county will be brought to a standstill and the chief sufferers will be the industrial areas. It is completely useless, the letter adds, for the Government to say that the roads will last for a year or two without maintenance. None of these minor roads has had any maintenance for over eight years and they are today worn out and on their last legs. That is an authoritative statement and it is borne out by another extract from a letter showing that the mechanisation of farms is making a heavier toll on the country roads by putting loads on them which they were not designed to carry. The extract states: The mechanisation of farms is causing heavier loading on these roads than they were built to carry, and I have been advising my committee for some time that they will have to spend a great deal more money on these roads if they are to maintain them in reasonable condition, and this is essential if agriculture is to function to its maximum efficiency. These extracts show how serious the position is when roads are not maintained properly.
What has been happening in the last year or two? I have given the position as the Minister stated it less than two years ago, but since then there have been cuts. The 1946–7 cuts were very heavy, involving 61 per cent. to 70 per cent. cut of surfacing work on trunk roads, and the elimination of all surfacing work and probably of tar spraying on other roads. 532 These were the cuts which have taken place in the last year or two, and this was on top of the state in which the roads were owing to the lack of maintenance during the war years. The result of these cuts is that, while during the war years these roads did not have the attention they should have had, the roads have very much deteriorated. Many of them are now subject to heavy milk lorries and other mechanical plant used on farms and they are getting worse and worse and will, in fact, break down unless something is done.
I took the opportunity because of the seriousness of this position of communicating with a county surveyor who was very experienced on the repair and maintenance of roads. I wanted to find out if possible what would happen if the servicing and repairs needed now to keep the roads in order were not carried out. This is what he said: The cost of reconstructing a road, rendered necessary through lack of maintenance, can often be ten times that which would be incurred on normal maintenance. If roads are not maintained adequately now, then in a short while ten times the money, labour and materials and so on will have to be spent to put them into proper order. He adds: Attempting to 'make do' with a low standard results in expenditure on previous maintenance being wasted since reconstruction will become necessary while failure to keep a road in good repair can only lead to the same result He goes on to say something to which I attach great importance and I hope the Parliamentary Secretary will note it: Apart from the need for adequate maintenance many roads have had only surface treatment over the past 20 years. For the first ten years this was all that was necessary but when more extensive attention was required it could not be proceeded with because of the war, and since the war, because of economic difficulties. As a result and by reason of exceptional war-time traffic, coupled with the cumulative effect of a vast increase in the use of heavy motor traffic, they are now in a very bad condition. Unless they are given attention, heavy expenditure on reconstruction will be incurred, in the near future or, what is worse, some roads may break up completely with serious effects on transport services caused by diversions having to be made on unsuitable roads, which themselves will become affected Rural roads already have to carry mechanised farm traffic far heavier than that for which they were designed and grants for their upkeep are being cut by as much as 50 per cent., this, of course, on top of the cuts imposed last year. 533 It is quite clear that this failure to maintain roads is going to become increasingly serious. Lack of attention of some quite trivial matters might result in closing a road of national importance. For example, through a lack of pointing of a culvert there may be a collapse, or through lack of cleaning of a gulley, a road may be flooded to an impassable depth. In the Midlands recently, on Road A6, Cavendish Bridge, near Shardlow, collapsed due to lack of maintenance of piers. We are in this country at the present time operating much below effective labour strength to keep the roads in a proper state of repair, and any further reduction is bound to do grievous harm. It will be foolish if the Government pursue a policy of penny wise, pound foolish.
I hope that this whole question will be reviewed by the Ministry of Transport. Why is it that in this capital programme there should be a maintenance cut? What I am referring to are not capital cuts but maintenance cuts. I note in paragraph 72 that the largest claim on the Ministry of Works labour force is for the maintenance of Government property which it is alleged is kept to an essential minimum. There has been no cut in that. There is no case that I can see elsewhere in this capital programme of maintenance cuts on railways or civil aviation, or anything of that kind. It seems to me that some explanation is required of this cut on road maintenance.
What is proposed? A saving of some 20,000 men. What is this force of 20,000 to be saved? Many of them are near old age pension age, and if they were dismissed it is very doubtful indeed whether they will go into rural housing or agriculture as was suggested in the White Paper. If we dismiss young men and keep on the old men, the labour force will collapse. Farmers themselves have said that they do not want these men. I cannot see the need for them in agriculture or in rural housing. Let me quote two personal examples. I am chairman of a company which manages agricultural property. This company wanted to put a bath into a farm house. Permission was refused although the labour and material were there. There was another building available which at less than half the cost of a new building, could have been made into a nice, comfortable, four-room 534 bungalow. The labour and materials were there, but, because of capital cuts and of the cutting of expenditure by the Government, it was not possible to do it.
There are plenty of men available for rural housing without taking them from this force. In addition, there are some 8,000 agricultural workers at present unemployed. I cannot see what advantage it is going to be if these men so urgently needed on the roads are dismissed. There is a further difficulty. The Parliamentary Secretary knows very well that the public service passenger fleet throughout the country is obsolete. A great many buses are more than 10 years old. They are in urgent need of maintenance repairs. Therefore, it is more than ever essential that the roads should be satisfactory. Otherwise, if we let the roads go, maintenance on these buses will go up and many more skilled men will be employed who could be used for the export trade or be otherwise employed. There will be breakdowns, absenteeism and loss of production.
Finally, I want to touch upon road safety. The Parliamentary Secretary is having a great road safety campaign, and we wish him success, but one of the most important things in connection with road safety is the proper maintenance and service of the roads. If they are full of potholes, cyclists will be swerving to avoid the bumps and there will be accidents. If this policy of cuts to repair and maintenance of roads is carried out there will be increased slaughter on the roads Seven thousand people a year are killed on the roads as against 24 on the railways. There is no question, I am glad to see, of a reduction of the maintenance of the permanent way of the railways. If it were suggested that the permanent way maintenance was not being looked after there would be anxiety. Yet here we are reducing maintenance on the road permanent way. What would people think if there were a cut in the maintenance of lighthouses and harbours endangering the safety of people sailing in ships? What if there were a cut in the maintenance of aircraft, runways and aerodromes. The public would not tolerate it, and I suggest that the public should not tolerate these cuts in maintenance expenditure on roads, which will affect the lives of our fellow-citizens.
535 Finally, I hope that the Parliamentary Secretary will consult local authorities on this matter, that he will think again, and, because of the points I have made, will ask the Minister to bring to the notice of his Cabinet colleagues the grave disaster which will occur to this country if he allows the road maintenance cut set out in the White Paper to be carried out.

§ Major Haughton (Antrim)
In support of my hon. Friend, I want to make three points, and hope that because of their brevity they will lose nothing in importance. Tomorrow, I imagine, we shall debate in this House the question of the cost of our British products, and my first point is that in this connection transport is a vital factor. The second is that I believe that road transport is a vital part of the transport system, and has attributes which are not possessed by other forms. The third point is that repairs must add tremendously to the capital expenditure which will ultimately have to be applied to roads.

§ The Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Transport (Mr. James Callaghan)
The hon. Member for St. Marylebone (Sir W. Wakefield) has deployed an extremely powerful case. I am very glad indeed that he has raised this matter, and that it will go into the official record that it has been discussed, because there is no doubt that the decision which has been taken by the Government—after full consideration—may involve some deterioration in the standards to which we were accustomed on our prewar roads, and the hon. Member has given me an opportunity of making some comments on the matter from the angle of the Government's approach.
He correctly read out extracts from paragraph 68 of the White Paper on Capital Investment in 1948, and summarised accurately what is the Government's intention. If we are to get this problem into perspective, he and we must also have a look at some of the other paragraphs of the White Paper, which must be regarded as a whole.
I think it is true to say that both sides of the House agree that cuts in capital investment must be made. We are agreed that, in the terms of Paragraph 4 of the 536 White Paper, the volume of new investment must be brought into proper relation with the supply of materials, industrial capacity and manpower which we can afford to make available for these purposes. While we may agree on objectives, we do not always agree on means, and when we come to apply the generalisation to a particular object the trouble starts. I repeat, by way of preamble, that road maintenance is one of many cuts in capital investment which are extremely unwelcome to the Government but which—I believe both sides will agree—have to be made if we are to bring our resources into proper relation with one another.
In those circumstances, I cannot accept the first point which the hon. Member made—that the wrong policy is being followed. I think this is a correct policy regarded as an economic policy. That is not to say that I welcome it as a road policy. It is not a road policy but a measure of the Government's economic policy. What the Government have done is to give a limit in the matter of road maintenance and repairs and to reduce new investment for roads, in order to get our resources into proper relation. It is not in fact the case, if I may correct the hon. Gentleman, that no one else has suffered in the field of maintenance. If I may quote from the Department for which my right hon. Friend is responsible, in the field of railways the number of railway coaches which the railways feel is desirable as replacement for maintenance is of the order of 3,000. Actually, they are getting 1,000.

§ Sir W. Wakefield
If the Parliamentary Secretary will pardon me, public service vehicles have been cut by 50 per cent., but in making my comparisons it was the railways permanent way and the roads. The railway permanent way carries the passenger coaches and the roads carry the public service vehicles.

§ Mr. Callaghan
I am anxious to compare like with like, and I do not follow the hon. Gentleman into the field of road safety. On the railways, safety is a matter of replacement, but we will not allow any road to get into the position where it will be unsafe, and new capital expenditure will be undertaken where necessary. This is one of the few cases where new capital expenditure will be undertaken if it can be shown that public safety is in danger. 537 The hon. Gentleman underestimates the degree of war arrears which have been overtaken. County surveyors have done an extraordinarily good job of work in the last two years. They have done extraordinarily well during the last summer and autumn, and also during the mild winter, to overtake some of the damage caused by the frost, floods and snow of last winter, and they have succeeded more than I should have expected. It is a great tribute to the way they have done their job.
I agree we are operating below an optimum labour strength. Certainly I do not think the Government would dissent from this fact. In normal times they would expect to find more and more men employed in road maintenance, but efforts are being made to reduce the numbers from 90,000 to 70,000, and only time will show whether the men will go into other essential work. Surveyors do not want to dissipate a balanced force which they have built up. They know their men and do not want to see them disappear. I can only say we have been in contact with highway authorities about this aspect of the problem and have consulted with the trade unions. Both of them have some evidence about the type of men who will be discharged and of the likelihood of their going into other work.
We intend to keep a close watch on the situation and to see that our hopes are fulfilled. When we make a severe cut of 20,000 men, there is bound to be some leakage before we can achieve the proper object of directing men into rural housing or cutting crops, both of which are necessary.
538 I would only say in conclusion that we propose to keep this policy continually under review. We do not intend to say "this is a flat cut and must stay." We want to adjust the burden as easily as we can on the backs of those who have to bear it. In addition, we shall have the advice of the Minister's own divisional road engineers who are out all the time and are constantly reporting to him on the state of the roads. While we hope that the councils will carry out what has been laid down by the Government, we want them to do all they can within the limited resources at their disposal to keep road maintenance at its highest level. It is no part of our case that we want road maintenance just cut down for its own sake. We want the local authorities to spread the jam as thinly as they can, over as wide an area as possible in order that road maintenance may be kept to the highest possible level. If the situation appears to be getting difficult, my right hon. Friend will have no hesitation in informing his Cabinet colleagues of that situation. The evidence, so far, does not point to that: I hope it will not arise, but if it does, the surveyors and all those who work with them will indeed have a difficult job to do.