COMMONS AMENDMENTS. (Hansard, 25 July 1930)

EARL RUSSELL
My Lords, your Lordships will notice that it is proposed to leave out Clauses 93 and 94 of the Bill, as it left you, and to insert two new clauses. The object is to make special provision for traffic in the Metropolitan Police district. There is a considerable change in this respect. It is now proposed that there should be constituted a Metropolitan traffic area consisting of the Metropolitan Police district and the City of London, and that one Commissioner shall be appointed for that area, in distinction from the three Commissioners appointed for the ordinary traffic areas. The clauses have been agreed with the Commissioner of Police, the Home Secretary and other persons concerned. As your Lordships will see, they are very long and complicated. The special duty of the Traffic Commissioner in London will be to issue road service licences for express carriage services—that is, motor coach services—in the Metropolitan area. These services are rapidly increasing in number, and they are practically under no form of control at present.
It is proposed that the control of the omnibuses should remain, as now, with the police, and that the police shall continue to inspect and license the public service vehicles, since they have the necessary staff, premises, equipment and experience and there is no reason to interfere with them. The object of the Traffic Commissioner is to co-ordinate that traffic which at present is not under any regulation and with which the Commissioner of Police has not very much power to deal. The provisions are complicated because, as your Lordships will appreciate, this is in a sense neither one system nor the other. It is not the simple system of Traffic Commissioners 894 that you have in the country, nor is it control by the Commissioner of Police at Scotland Yard, with all the powers of a Traffic Commissioner. It is a sort of mixture of the two systems, to allow for the two classes of service that have to be dealt with, and it is at the moment the best solution that can be arrived at. I think it has satisfied all those concerned with the matter, and I hope your Lordships will see your way to agree to these new clauses being substituted for the two old clauses which have been omitted.

§ EARL HOWE
My Lords, before we pass from this I would like to ask one or two questions. First of all with regard to the Commissioner. Is it intended that the Commissioner should be exactly the same class of man as the other Commissioners right throughout the country, or necessarily a nominee of Scotland Yard? Then, what will be the position of the Commissioner vis-a-vis the London Traffic Advisory Committee? Will his functions interfere with their jurisdiction? Does he have to consult with them? I believe he has to consult with the Commissioner of Police, but what sort of liaison is going to be set up between the Commissioner and the London Traffic Advisory Committee? Then I would like to know whether in the power supposed to be given to him he is going to have the power to say where the stopping places and parking places of all the various long distance motor coach services are to be, and whether it is possible for the Commissioner to fix stopping places outside the central area, adjacent to other means of transport, like the Underground Railway stations.

EARL RUSSELL
The Commissioner, of course, is appointed in exactly the same way as other Commissioners, by the Minister of Transport. Whether he will fix stopping places I cannot at the moment say, but, of course, it is perfectly obvious that even if he had the technical power to fix stopping places he would not do it without consultation with the Commissioner of Police, on whom is the primary duty. His power does not extend outside the Metropolitan Police area, and in fact the duty must remain 895 with the Commissioner of Police, because he has to regulate the traffic. With regard to the London Traffic Advisory Committee, they exist for the purpose of advising the Minister. They are, what they are stated to be, an advisory Committee, and the Commissioner will not come in conflict with them in any way.

§ EARL HOWE
There is one other question. With regard to the various classes of traffic using the streets, will the Commissioner have dictatorial powers over London traffic? Will he be able to say to horse-drawn vehicles that they are not to ply in London streets between certain hours?

EARL RUSSELL
No, those powers are possessed by the Minister of Transport, if he thinks fit to exercise them.

§ LORD JESSEL
I know that the London Traffic Advisory Committee is only an advisory Committee, but the Commissioner of Police always does send recommendations to them, and asks their opinion. Would the new Commissioner do the same? Is there any contact between them at all?

EARL RUSSELL
All these bodies keep in contact, and naturally anybody would be glad to have the advice of the London Traffic Advisory Committee.