HL Deb 26 January 1956 vol 195 cc611-6

3.19 p.m.

LORD MONKSWELL rose to call attention to the finance of the nationalised British Railways; and to move for Papers. The noble Lord said: My Lords, last March we had a debate on transport, much of it related to the railways. Many noble Lords expressed various views on the subject, but what particularly impressed me was that the question of finance was hardly mentioned during the whole debate. We were, and are, face to face with the position that the nationalised railways are steadily and heavily losing money and are proposing, with Government sanction, to spend some £1,200 million in the hope of remedying the situation.

By far the greater part of this outlay is to be spent on changing over from steam traction to other forms, principally electric and diesel. In these circumstances it is a matter of the highest importance to take every precaution to ensure that the proposed change-over is likely to achieve the economies desired. So far as I know, no information on this vital matter has been published; no figures of the results of existing lines worked by electric or diesel traction. and no estimates. We are merely told it is to be done and that it will be paid for out of a loan guaranteed by the taxpayers. Some of the modernisation contemplated—such as improved signalling and stronger permanent way seems to be little more than ordinary maintenance. The question of enlarged mineral wagons fitted with continuous brakes is so controversial that I do not propose to say anything on the subject. But when it comes to the abandonment of the steam locomotive and a complete change-over to new forms of traction, surely we should proceed with the utmost caution. I am sorry to say that I see little sign of caution in the attitude of either the Government or the Transport Commission. It is the old trouble —secrecy; the gentleman from Whitehall knowing better than anyone else, and trampling under foot anyone who asks for reasons.

My attention was first directed to the relative merits of different forms of railway traction by what appeared to me to be the efforts of the Southern Railway to avoid disclosing to the shareholders and to the public the financial results of their large electrification scheme, begun about forty years ago. So far as I know—and I have been doing my best all the time to find out—no figures on the subject of the relative costs of steam and electric traction have been published either by the railway management when the railway was a private company or by the Transport Commission. Instead, at general meetings the chairman used to give the shareholders, and enlarge upon, little snippets of information, such as the number of afternoon passengers from Sevenoaks or the economies secured by the absence of coal consumption by standby steam locomotives. But of the overall relative financial results there was never a word. I have attended a general meeting at which shareholders kept on shouting to be given this information but were refused. When we look for figures to support the economy which the undoubtedly considerable change-over from steam traction in many countries to other forms of traction is supposed to have brought about, so far as I know there is nothing at all. As I have already said, I have kept a pretty close watch and have found nothing. If the Government have such figures I hope that they will disclose them to the House.

The United States, France and Germany have all, to a greater or less extent, superseded the steam locomotive. The United States have probably gone further in this direction than any other country. Perhaps the most powerful industrial organisation in the United States is that of the oil companies. Has the enormous influence which they wield nothing to do with it? We hear of the elaborate trouble taken to make sure that every possible step is taken to glorify the oil engine—new tools, new shops, arrangements for ensuring maximum mileage for the oil engine—all quite different from anything that was ever done for the steam locomotive. Some United Stales railways, in their anxiety to help the oil engine, appear to have broken up almost new steam locomotives. France has lately electrified many of her railways, and at the present time runs the best trains in Europe; but whether these magnificent trains depend on electrification is a moot point. I happen to have a lot of experience of French steam locomotives, gained by sixty years acquaintance with them, and my own belief is that the same results could be achieved with steam. I have never seen any figures to show superior economy for electricity. In Germany, also, new forms of traction are much used. But there again there are no figures.

Why is it that the Transport Commission keep on telling us that electric and diesel traction are better than steam traction? All three can do everything that is required on surface lines. In efficiency the differences between them are trifling. As regards electrification, the Commission do not claim that electricity can compare favourably with steam unless the traffic reaches what they describe as a "minimum density"—see paragraph 30, page 12 of their Report—and they give no estimate of what may be expected if "minimum density" is reached. In particular, they do not give figures for lines where electrically-worked traffic has existed for many years. The claim constantly made for electricity, that on eke-trifled lines a much quicker succession of trains can be worked, cannot be accepted, because this is made possible entirely by improved signalling, which can easily be installed on any line and does not depend upon the establishment of enormously expensive conducting rails or wires. It is also claimed that electricity has an advantage over steam because an electric engine does not have to carry its power supply with it. I should have thought that it was exactly the other way, and that the self-contained steam engine has an advantage over the electric engine by being independent of power supply. This is especially so in the case of enemy action or civil disturbance.

With some concern, I notice that the Transport Commission does not seem to know its own mind on the subject of electrification. Electrification started in a muddle. Each of the three companies which were amalgamated to form the Southern Railway had a system which differed from those of the other two. At considerable expense the differences were overcome, but it now turns out that the system adopted by all three is not nearly so good as one of the various systems now used in France. This system, though promising economics in working, appears to require overhead wiring, for which British loading gauges do not provide enough room; so it would be necessary to reconstruct most of the tunnels and overline bridges. How much would the Severn Tunnel, four miles long and under the river, cost to reconstruct? There is a glorious muddle in the making. Then there is the question of the cost of electric current. It is often said that in a few years atomic stations will be able to supply all we want al a small fraction of present-day costs. My own information is that for a long time to come the atomic stations will be unable to cheapen the supply of current at all. This is a subject that Government must know all about and I hope they will tell us the facts.

As regards diesel traction, diesel locomotives are much more expensive than steam locomotives in first cost, and, although without a boiler, have far more complicated machinery. Diesel exhaust, too, is more poisonous than the smoke which conies from steam locomotives. The claim is made that both electric and diesel motors work more continuously than steam locomotives. This is just what we want to find out, but no facts or figures are given. It is easy, by manipulating timetables, to get any results de- sired. In the United States, the Norfolk and Western Railway have arranged for refilling their boilers with hot water, emptying fire-boxes and putting in clean fire, all in the space of an hour or less. As it appears to be proposed to spend several hundreds of millions of pounds on re-equipping our railways with electric and diesel machines by means of a loan guaranteed by the taxpayers, I suggest that much more information should be published before the scheme is gone on with. Can it be that the whole thing is due to the spectacular failure of the National Coal Board to bring to the surface locomotive coal sufficient either in quantity or quality in a country where the reserves of coal, much of it of excellent quality, are estimated to be sufficient for 400 years? I am unable to believe the rumour that the Government, finding the situation in the coalfields so difficult to deal with, have given up the attempt. Are we so decadent that we must abandon the one industry that above all others has made this country great? Surely our present failure is only a temporary lapse which will pass.

Meanwhile, if the coal really cannot be found, it is always possible to keep the trains running by burning oil in the fire boxes. We are constantly being told that electric traction, dependent upon power stations which can be fed with indifferent fuel because the size of the grates is not limited, will release a large quantity of locomotive coal which is urgently needed elsewhere. We are never told where or why it is needed. Locomotive coal is different from household coal and the two are not interchangeable. Moreover, only about one-third of the trains running require first-rate coal. In these circumstances, I should have thought that by far the most economic way of using locomotive fuel was to burn it in the fireboxes of steam locomotives, thereby rendering unnecessary the expenditure of some hundreds of millions of pounds which the Transport Commission tell us the change-over will cost.

The root of the troubles on the railways, exactly like that of most of our other financial troubles, is that at a time of maximum impoverishment owing to the destruction of wealth by two great wars, we have endeavoured to introduce a general standard of living for which the means are not available. A bankrupt can pretend that he is a rich man so long as he can lay hands on capital to spend. Our so-called prosperity is brought about by living on capital—otherwise inflation: inflation and living on capital are very nearly the same thing. The proposal is that we shall increase inflation by spending hundreds of millions of pounds on superseding the steam locomotive. It may create the impression that something is being done and so help to put off for a short time the reckoning which our own proceedings have brought upon us. But at what a price! My Lords, I beg to move for Papers.