LIGHT RAILWAYS BILL. (Hansard, 11 August 1896)

*THE CHAIRMAN OF COMMITTEES
moved the insertion, after Clause 2, of the following new clause:— No application for an order under this Act shall be granted by the Light Railway Commissioners, unless such railway is projected, mainly—

(a.) For the conveyance of agricultural produce; or

(b.) For communication with harbours and fishing villages; or

(c.) To open up remote and thinly populated districts; and does not exceed 20 miles in length.
Provided that the Light Railway Commissioners may sanction a railway of greater length, but in that ease they shall make a special report to the Board of Trade, and such report shall, with the decision of the Board thereon, be laid before Parliament. The noble Earl said the object of his proposed new clause was to attempt to confine the scope of the Bill to the objects which its promoters avowed it was intended to meet. But it was desirable to give some elasticity to it, so he proposed that where the Light Railways Commissioners thought a greater length than 20 miles was desirable they should sanction it, provided they made a special report to Parliament. If the 470 Government could suggest any other purposes than those mentioned in the clause to which the Light Railways might be adapted, he should be glad to add them. He had taken the words nearly Verbatim from the 5th Clause of the Bill itself, which set out the conditions under which special advances by the Treasury were to be made, and they were confined to the cases enumerated in his clause. The objections he took to the Bill on the Second Reading were by no means removed by anything that had subsequently taken place. Those objections were mainly to the uncontrolled transference to a branch of Executive and certain Commissioners of powers that had hitherto been exercised exclusively by Parliament. Under the Bill at present those powers were practically undefined. They extended over every tramway and every railway in the country or could be so extended if the Commissioners and the Board of Trade agreed. Under the Bill there was nothing to prevent a limited company or an individual applying for and obtaining powers to construct a light railway through any street of the Metropolis or any large town; and so, under the pretence of a light railway, evading all the provisions of the Tramways Acts as to provisions that the rails should not be above the surface of the road; that the frontages should be consulted, also the local authorities; nor was there anything to prevent a large railway company—the Great Western, or London and North Western—making branches all over the country, which could not be differentiated from branches made by their less fortunate rivals. The answer of course was, "You must trust that the Commissioners and the Board of Trade will use these powers with discretion." He hoped they might trust them, and he had no reason at present to doubt that their confidence would be well placed. But the Commissioners and the Presidents of the Board of Trade were not everlasting. Individuals changed, and it was an entirely new principle in our legislation that they should give to branches of the Executive unlimited powers simply in the confidence that they would not be abused. Let the House consider for a moment what the principle led to. If they gave the Board of Trade these powers in the case of railways, what 471 argument could they use if the Local Government Board applied for similar powers in the case of sanitary and street improvements and the hundred and one objects which localities now came to Parliament to obtain under Public Health Bills. It was a principle capable of large development, and development not without danger. One of the arguments of his hon. Friend who had charge of the Bill in favour of the clause relating to compulsory taking of land was that it had a precedent in the Allotments Act. That pointed to the danger of development. Compulsory powers under the Allotments Act were given to meet a special case absolutely different from giving powers for constructing or making railways or tramways, and how could they draw an analogy between two or three acres that might be wanted for an allotment ground, and the miles of laud that might be wanted for constructing railways. He had called attention to these matters, because it showed how dangerous it was to apply to one set of conditions principles that had been applied already to another set of conditions absolutely and totally different. He would say no more on the subject. The object of the clause he had moved was to limit to some extent the area over which the principle of the Bill would have its scope. The object of the Bill was to make the construction and promotion of railways cheaper. With this he was certain their Lordships would all sympathise. But let them remember that cheapness might be purchased at somewhat too great a sacrifice of important principles, and he ventured to say the object might have been efficiently attained without so violent a departure from the existing methods of legislation. He believed the clause he had proposed would somewhat improve the Bill by limiting its scope, and he hoped the Government would see their way to accept it.

*THE SECRETARY TO THE BOARD OF TRADE (The EARL of DUDLEY)
said it was not necessary for him to follow his noble Friend in the observations he had made as to the powers it was proposed to confer on the Commissioners and the Board of Trade under this Bill. That matter had already been fully discussed upon the Committee stage of the Bill, and it therefore seemed to him only necessary he 472 should remind their Lordships that this Commission was limited to the specified term of five years, and therefore, it would be always open to Parliament at the end of that time, if it disapproved of the action the Commission had taken to put an end to the procedure set up in this Bill. He hoped the House would not be led away by the arguments which his noble Friend had so ably put before it into accepting the Amendment because it would injuriously affect and limit the scope and provisions of this Bill. It would exclude the schemes which the Government hoped would be promoted under the facility clauses of the Bill and confine the establishment of light railways to those very cases in which the prospect of profit was the smallest. He might remind the House that under the provisions of this Bill they contemplated the establishment of two different classes of railway, and they had in view the extension of railway communication in two different sorts of districts. On the one hand there were districts in which the establishment of light railways would be for purposes such as those specified in the Amendment of his noble Friend—railways for agricultural produce, for communication with harbours and fishing villages or to open up remote and thinly populated districts, and they believed that in regard to those districts it was only by State aid and by a cheapening of the procedure that they should be able to facilitate the extension of railway communication. But there was also another sort of district they hoped to develop under the provisions of this Bill, districts which could not be called "remote and thinly populated," but which were not thickly populated; districts in which various small industries existed, and in which a light railway was wanted not mainly for any particular purpose, but for general convenience; for instance, for connecting one village with another, or one small town with another in exactly the same way, but on a different scale, as large trunk lines were required throughout the country generally. Why was it such districts were at present very often without adequate means of railway communication? Because the capital cost of promotion under the existing procedure was so large that the receipts from such districts would not probably return a fair rate of interest 473 upon the money invested in making the line. But if the procedure was cheapened, the circumstances would be altogether changed and under the altered conditions they believed many other lines would be constructed by existing railway companies as feeders for their main system without any application to Parliament whatever for State aid. If, however, they analysed too strictly the precise objects of these light railways it might be found absolutely impossible to make them conform to the limitations desired by his noble Friend. They might not be intended for any particular purpose; they might be required for all sorts of purposes, and therefore, unless it could be shown that they were intended either for the carriage of agricultural produce or for the development of the fishing industry, his noble Friend would forbid their establishment, and force the promoters either to abandon the whole scheme or to fall back upon the present expensive procedure before Parliament. As he had said before, he believed the provisions of this Pill would be mainly used by existing railway companies for the construction of light branch lines, and they could not get these railway companies to promote schemes if they tied them down merely, or even mainly, to the unremunerative traffic involved in the carriage of agricultural and fishing produce. This was one of the main objections he had to the Amendment of his noble Friend, but there were also one or two minor defects. In the first place, under the Amendment who was to decide if a light railway fulfilled the conditions laid down by his noble Friend? He had no doubt the noble Earl meant that the Commissioners were to decide it, but he did not say so, and he was advised that if the clause was inserted in the Bill there would be constant danger of continual legal contests as to whether a light railway was really intended for the one purpose specified in the Amendment. Again, supposing a light railway was established from an agricultural district into a town and conveyed agricultural produce to that town, who was to decide whether it was mainly an agricultural railway or a railway to convey town produce. Possibly the bulk and value of the produce that it took back to the country from the town would be greater than that which it 474 brought from the country into the town, and yet if that were so, according to the Amendment, he took it, it was a railway which ought not in fact to have been established. Then why did his noble Friend fix upon agriculture and fishing as the only industries which were to benefit under this Bill? Why should not light railways be established, for instance, in Wales, to some of the slate quarries, or some of the coalfields throughout England and other parts of the Kingdom? His noble Friend was good enough in his speech to say that if the Government could suggest any other industries that required light railways, he would extend his Amendment to cover them. Put there might be requirements for light railways where it was impossible to specify any particular industry that would benefit by them and, therefore, the Government wished to make the provisions of this Bill so elastic and wide that cases of that sort would be taken into account, and light railways, no matter for what purpose, would be established, and the trade of the community, no matter to what branch it might belong, would derive the benefit it was hoped would result from the provisions of the Bill. He hoped he had said enough to convince their Lordships that if the Amendment was inserted it would very injuriously affect the provisions of the Bill and limit its scope. He therefore hoped his noble Friend would not press it to a Division.

THE CHAIRMAN OF COMMITTEES
said that, after what had fallen from the noble Lord, he did not think it wise to press the Amendment to a Division, and would therefore withdraw it.

THE CHAIRMAN OF COMMITTEES
called attention to the fact that in paragraph (c) Sub-section (1) of Clause 5, the expression was used "and every such parish shall be notified of the intention, etc." The word" notified "in that sense was new to the Statute Book, and he suggested that" informed" would be a better word.

§ *THE EARL OF DUDLEY
said he would accept the word "informed" in place of "notified."
475 Word "notified" struck out; word "informed" inserted instead thereof.