ROAD TRANSPORT (FUEL OIL TAX) (Hansard, 17 February 1954)

§ Mr. Frank McLeavy (Bradford, East)
It would be out of order for me, on the Motion for the Adjournment of the House, to urge that legislation should be introduced to deal with the fuel oil position. I propose, therefore, to confine myself tonight to the task of placing before the Treasury a picture of the difficulties at present confronting the passenger transport industry in the hope that when the position is reviewed these difficulties, along with other matters and facts, will be taken into account.
The present position of road transport has been the subject of representations to the Chancellor of the Exchequer by the Transport and General Workers' Union, the Trades Union Congress and the four associations representing the employers' side of the road passenger transport industry. I trust, therefore, that the Chancellor, in taking into consideration the strong representations which have been made, will pay special attention to those made by the Trades Union Congress, whose representations deal with the wider aspect of the problems of the travelling public. I suggest that no body is more capable than the T.U.C. of advising upon the impact which ever-increasing bus fares must have upon industrial wage claims.
What are the facts about the fuel oil position? I am sure that the Financial Secretary will not mind my referring to the incidence of taxation in order that we may get a complete picture of the position.

§ Mr. Speaker
This is going to be a very awkward subject for the hon. Member to discuss on the Adjournment, because the rate of fuel oil taxation is fixed by successive Finance Bills, and the rules on matters raised on the Adjournment which involve legislation appear to me to make it a very narrow field in which the hon. Member has to operate.

§ Mr. McLeavy
I was wondering, Mr. Speaker, whether it might be possible to 2117 deal with the development and growth of the tax in order to get the background of the argument which I should like to submit to the Treasury on this matter.

§ Mr. Speaker
I do not think that an historical account of the matter would be out of order so long as the hon. Member is not suggesting, as a result of his review, that the tax should be altered in the forthcoming Budget, or at any other time.

§ Mr. McLeavy
Within those limitations, Mr. Speaker, I should like to give the background of the argument in order that we might examine for a short while the exceedingly difficult position of the transport industry.

§ The Financial Secretary to the Treasury (Mr. John Boyd-Carpenter)
As I understand your Ruling, Mr. Speaker, it follows that, however convincing the hon. Gentleman's suggestions may be, any arguments on my part on the subject of the level of the fuel duty—which can only be altered by legislation—would be debarred to me, and therefore, no matter how interesting the historical background, I am not in a position to answer.

§ Mr. Speaker
That seems to be the root of the matter. The Adjournment should really be used to raise matters and complaints where an administrative remedy is available. Here, the only remedy to the hon. Gentleman's complaint is legislation, and it seems to me that if the Minister is debarred from reply, the hon. Member, equally, is debarred by the rules of order from raising the matter, unless he can make a speech somehow, without suggesting that the tax is too high and should be reduced.

§ Mr. McLeavy
I gathered from your previous Ruling that you would not object to a kind of historical review of taxation to provide a background to the position, Mr. Speaker. I appreciate the Financial Secretary's position. I should not expect from him any comment upon a purely factual statement of the development of fuel taxation, and if it will present the Financial Secretary with some difficulty I shall not pursue that point.
It may well be that the Financial Secretary, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, and the House are not fully aware of the duties and responsibilities of 2118 the road passenger transport undertakings. The duty of an omnibus undertaking is to provide adequate services not only to the populated areas but to the rural districts. In that respect it is some what different from the ordinary industrial undertaking. The transport undertaking cannot choose to exploit the purely profitable lines, but in many cases must provide unremunerative countryside services and meet the loss from the better paying routes.
Owing to its various financial difficulties it is becoming increasingly difficult for the transport industry to provide that frequency of service which is convenient in the thickly populated areas. In the rural areas there is obviously a tendency for further restriction of services—for the same financial reason. I had hoped to give to the Financial Secretary and to the House some statistics relating to the mileage cost of running our municipal omnibus undertakings.
I will, however, content myself by saying that it is quite clear that many municipal undertakings are working under extremely difficult circumstances. Their financial resources are limited, and they have a responsibility to municipal authorities and to the inhabitants of their areas to provide adequate and reasonably fair services. Owing to their many financial difficulties most municipal undertakings have to make repeated applications for authority to increase their fares.
One of the most important factors in keeping down the cost of living is the maintenance of a reasonable level of fare charges. The travelling public should also be given reasonable facilities. These are problems which might well be pondered over by the Chancellor of the Exchequer and his colleagues. Certain municipal transport undertakings are trying to do away with workmen's fares. If that development is carried into effect it will create dissatisfaction among the thousands of work people who have to travel day in and day out to their work. They will have to meet an increased expenditure which, in turn, will give rise to further claims for increases of wages. It is vitally important that we should endeavour to find a way by which fares can be kept down to a minimum.
I do not know whether the Chancellor of the Exchequer or the Financial Secretary 2119 appreciates the fact that the passenger transport industry has probably rendered as great a service as any other industry towards our economic and industrial development, and in providing facilities for the social life of the community. Yet, in terms of money, it has received nothing like the amounts which are being received by other industrial undertakings.
The position of the transport worker is being seriously affected because of the very limited financial resources of municipal transport undertakings. I have spent a lifetime in the passenger transport side of the industry, and I do not think that anybody can suggest that drivers or conductors are in receipt of wages which are commensurate to their responsibilities to the traveling public.
As a matter of fact, I would assert that their standard of wages and the conditions of employment are inferior to many of the industrial concerns in the country. We are asking these people not merely to work in less favourable conditions of employment and for wages which are lower, but we are asking them to sacrifice much of their social and home life because of the nature of their employment. Nearly half their life time is spent either on late shifts or special duty, on Sunday work or Saturday work and in working on Bank holidays when everyone else is going out with his family.
These are facts which the Treasury ought to take into consideration in considering the financial difficulties of this industry. I make this final point to the Treasury and to the Financial Secretary. It is that the importance of the passenger transport service to the communal and industrial life of this country entitles it to receive from the Treasury more sympathetic consideration than it has received in the past from the Treasury in respect of its financial difficulties.

§ The Financial Secretary to the Treasury (Mr. John Boyd-Carpenter)
The hon. Member for Bradford, East (Mr. McLeavy) has been sufficiently long in this House to know, and to know in advance, how unsatisfactory this sort of debate must be on the Adjournment.
I know, and the House knows, the subject which he really has in mind, and the 2120 hon. Member knows perfectly well, and, indeed, Mr. Speaker has so ruled, that it is a subject on which I am debarred from presenting the case for the Government by the rules of order. Mr. Speaker did say, Mr. Deputy Speaker, that on the Adjournment it was, on the whole, more appropriate to raise administrative matters. It is not for me to suggest to the hon. Member, who has had the good fortune to win a place in the Ballot, what subject he should select, but I think that I am entitled to protest that he should attempt to raise a subject which he knows perfectly well I am not in a position to deal with under the rules of order.
He then went on to discuss very interesting matters relating to the transport industry in general. The hon. Member knows perfectly well that these matters are not the responsibility either of my right hon. Friend the Chancellor or of myself. In so far as he raised matters in connection with the transport industry generally, had he really wanted a reply, he could have given notice to my right hon. Friend the Minister of Transport and Civil Aviation. The hon. Member knows that my right hon. Friend would, in these circumstances, have been here to give him a full and courteous answer.
What the hon. Member has done has been to put down a subject for discussion which includes the word "taxation," although from his experience of the House, which is considerable, he knows perfectly well that neither he nor I can discuss that. It is certainly not my fault if this is inevitably an unsatisfactory debate, and one which anyone with any experience of the procedure of this House must have known in advance would be an unsatisfactory debate.
So far as the general affairs of the transport industry are concerned, I am quite certain that the Minister of Transport and Civil Aviation will give it all the consideration which it deserves. Equally, the hon. Member will not expect me to arrogate to myself the Departmental responsibility of my right hon. Friend and attempt to deal with the manifold, complex and difficult problems of the transport industry. Indeed, it would be most improper were I so to do. So we are left with the fact that what the hon. Member wishes to discuss is a matter which, under the Rules of the House, cannot be discussed, and that is the ques- 2121 tion of taxation and the level of taxation imposed in successive Finance Bills. I do not propose to trespass on your forbearance, Mr. Deputy-Speaker, by attempting, as the hon. Gentleman did, to discuss that subject in these circumstances.

§ Mr. Boyd-Carpenter
The hon. Gentleman has sufficiently abused the Rules of this House, and he should allow me to finish my speech.

§ Mr. McLeavy
On a point of order, Mr. Deputy-Speaker. I think it is most improper, and I submit to you that it is entirely wrong, for the Minister to say that in the presence of Mr. Speaker I have abused the Rules of this House. Mr. Speaker did raise certain points with me, and I immediately conformed to the limitations which he imposed. I think it is disgraceful that the Minister should suggest that I have done anything which, in the view of Mr. Speaker, was improper.

§ Mr. Boyd-Carpenter
What I have just said was that the hon. Gentleman attempted to do so and was stopped by Mr. Speaker.

§ Mr. Deputy-Speaker (Sir Charles MacAndrew)
The hon. Member for Bradford. East (Mr. McLeavy) knows very well that taxation cannot be raised on the Adjournment and even since I 2122 have been in the Chair I heard him raising points for which the right hon. Gentleman the Financial Secretary has no responsibility.

§ Mr. Boyd-Carpenter
Perhaps I may conclude these thoroughly unsatisfactory proceedings by saying that on an appropriate occasion when, under the Rules of Order, I am free to do so, I shall be very glad to debate any question of taxation with the hon. Gentleman or, indeed, with any of his hon. Friends. The House knows perfectly well that appropriate occasions for that sort of discussion are in the course of the calendar, not very far off, and that these matters can then be properly, appropriately and conveniently discussed.
Until then, Mr. Deputy-Speaker, both your Ruling and the general practice of the House forbid me, as the hon. Gentleman knows, to deploy that argument. But I should not like the hon. Gentleman or people outside this House to think that because I cannot deploy it tonight there is not a perfectly valid argument, whichI very much hope will be submitted to the test of proper Parliamentary discussion on an appropriate Parliamentary occasion.