§ LORD STRATHSPEY rose to call attention to a serious menace in many of our streets, caused by thoughtless motorists, especially to people about to enter trams. The noble Lord said: My Lords, this Notice refers to a menace and a danger that is arising in this country, but I do not propose to deal with the broad question of the dangers of motor traffic. My object is merely to call attention to the danger as affecting passengers on trains. In New Zealand and Australia when trains go along a road all traffic going in the same direction stops at the stopping places. There is no question of police being there to enforce the rule that traffic shall stop; it stops automatically. I think the same rule ought to be in force here for the benefit of the people in general. I wish to say that, generally speaking, motorists in this country are exceedingly considerate, but there is a class whom we can only call "road hogs." They consider nothing but their own personal convenience.
§ The other day my wife and I and various other people were at Hammersmith, and we stepped off the footpath on to the road to get on to a tram in the middle of the road. A motor car was approaching about fifty yards away, and we naturally thought it would stop, but its pace never slackened in the slightest, and we had to step back very sharply on to the footpath, or else we should have been run over. The driver of that car was a woman, and I am sorry to say that when she passed us she looked round and laughed. Had some young children or old people, who are not so agile as middle-aged people, been in our position, what would have happened to them? It is all very well to say that the motorist would have stopped, but one could see from her attitude that she had no intention of stopping. Certainly her pace was fully twenty or twenty-five miles an hour.
§ I think it would be of considerable advantage if the police were given fuller powers in this matter. When one considers 499 the deplorable number of accidents that happen through the rank and wanton carelessness of motorists and motorcyclists, one can see that something radical must be done, and done at once. There is no time to waste. Traffic in London is getting very congested, and the authorities now are considering how to deal with it at various points. This is a matter which might very well be considered at the same time and certain rules laid down to deal with it.
§ LORD DESBOROUGHMy Lords, on behalf of the Home Office I have to say that I am afraid it is rather late in the Session to enter into the whole question of the danger to the population caused by thoughtless motorists, but I hope that my noble friend will be satisfied when I tell him that the general question is under the serious consideration of the Government, that in the last gracious Speech from the Throne a Road Vehicles Bill was promised, and that this matter has been very actively pursued, and it is hoped that the activities of thoughtless motorists—whom I should be the very last person in this House to defend—will be curbed.
The second part of the Notice refers especially to people about to enter trams. This matter, I rather gather, has been brought to the attention of my noble friend owing to a certain personal experience which he has just related to us. I do not quite know why only people who are about to enter trams should be protected, and not the people who are just leaving them. That also, perhaps, is a matter which was affected by my noble friend's unfortunate experience. But the whole matter with regard to the second portion of the Notice has already been dealt with in your Lordships' House in a debate which took place on July 7 last, and I shall be very happy to give my noble friend a copy of the Report of the debate in which the whole question was very fully entered into. The whole matter arose then on a Bill which was before your Lordships' House, in which it was sought to enact that when tramcars were stationary and people were either entering or leaving them all the motors on the near side should come to a stop. This matter was referred by the Home Office to the Ministry of Transport, to the Chief 500 Constables, to motorists and also to the Chief Commissioner of Police, and by a large majority, almost unanimously in fact, they were all opposed to this provision being incorporated in an Act of Parliament. Indeed, a very serious step was taken when the Committee reported in its favour in reference to the Newcastle Bill. The subject was debated on the floor of the House and the House came to the conclusion that it would be an unwise step to take, and that particular provision was withdrawn from the Bill.
That is the position. These two matters have been very fully gone into and as there is a Bill in contemplation by the Government, which has been promised in two gracious Speeches from the Throne, I think it is unnecessary for me to say anything more than to thank the noble Lord for having drawn the attention of the Government to his own personal experience and to acid that no doubt what he has said will be duly taken into consideration when the Bill which has long been promised comes to your Lordships' attention. But for the General Strike, the coal strike and other serious matters, the Bill, no doubt, would have been introduced are this.
THE EARL OF CRAWFORDMy Lords, I shall not detain you for more than a minute or two but I should like to thank my noble friend Lord Desborough for his announcement. Like everybody else I am conscious that there are not only bad manners but dangerous manners on the part of people who drive motor cars. I recommend Lord Strathspey if this happens again to try taking the number of the offending car and bringing the motorist into Court. I think it is the general experience that magistrates realise that danger to life from motor cars driven at an improper speed is great, and if they will continue to impose swingeing fines, to suspend licences and, if necessary, to inflict imprisonment a lot of these grievances, hardships and dangers will very quickly vanish. That really is a matter for the magistracy.
But to impose restrictions such as Lord Strathspey recommends on traffic passing stationary tram cars is a very serious thing to do. There are parts of certain streets in London and elsewhere, too, where there is always a tram car standing 501 still. When a train car is standing still at the terminus, outside Victoria Station, for instance, or on the Embankment, you never know whether somebody is going to get in or out and you would immobilise the whole of the traffic in the street. Tram cars are almost always in the middle of the street, a ridiculous place for people to have to get in or out; but that is a limitation of a ridiculous method of traction and certainly an obsolete one, which was excellent fifty years ago but is being scrapped by all the progressive municipalities in Europe. But actually in Edinburgh, in London, and in other places strips of pavement are laid down in the middle of the road in order to have tramways. It is ridiculous. Tramways cause quite enough congestion already, and I am sure that my noble friend Lord Desborough would not be wheedled and cajoled into making the congestion worse. It is bad enough at present and the difficulty of transport will continue to get greater without any such addition as that.
§ LORD KNARESBOROUGHMy Lords, I should like to ask the noble Lord whether the law is the same for all mechanically-driven vehicles. It is common knowledge to everyone driving about the streets that motor-cyclists are allowed to travel at any pace they like. If you drive at any great pace in a motor car you are pulled up, but every day motor cyclists travel at enormous speeds and nobody stops them. Will my noble friend kindly tell me whether the law is the same for all mechanically driven vehicles?
§ LORD DESBOROUGHI think the Regulations are drawn up under Section 1 of the Motor Car Act, 1903. But the whole matter is coming under the consideration of His Majesty's Government. We cannot alter it now.