HL Deb 06 December 1965 vol 271 cc82-93

6.42 p.m.

THE EARL OF KINNOULL rose to ask Her Majesty's Government whether they are aware of the increasing congestion of the daily commuter traffic on the rail services both into London and into provincial cities and whether they are now able to announce their future plans to relieve this congestion. The noble Earl said: My Lords, in raising this subject of commuter traffic this evening, I do so in the belief that it is one of the main social problems facing the Government at the present time, ane one which must be acted on very quickly if the Government are to avoid a general thrombosis spreading through our cities. Before coming here to-day, I sought the views of the railway authorities, city planners and some local authorities. One is left with the impression that the challenge of this problem must be accepted by three partners. First, good planning; secondly, capital expenditure; and, finally, State subsidy.

Perhaps I may first describe the present commuter traffic problem as I see it. At present 90 per cent. of this traffic is looked after by public transport and the remaining 10 per cent. by private transport. The bulk of the responsibility lies with the railways. Those who commute daily by rail are finding it more and more difficult to obtain a seat. In some areas, notably in Kent, over one-third of the passengers are forced to stand, sometimes for up to an hour, when travelling to and from their work. Many of these people leave the heavily congested surburban trains to battle their way on to the Underground services. By the time these people reach their destinations, the first thing they require is a cup of tea to revive them. I do not think that I have exaggerated the situation at all.

The railway authorities are, of course, very concerned at this state of affairs and their view was expressed clearly in the Report, Re-shaping of British Railways. They admit that in many areas, particularly South of London, saturation point has been reached and passengers suffer extreme discomfort. The railway authorities say that they are doing their best to extend capacity. I understand that they are enlarging carriages, lengthening platforms and trains, and even improving the signalling system. But the crux of the matter, surely, is that the capacity of the system is limited by physical restrictions and any real expansion of capacity requires a large capital investment.

If one looks at the South-East Study Report one notices that a figure of £100 million is mentioned as the capital required, but the railways point out that the existing commuter services cost them something like £13 million a year at the present time. I understand that this sum could well reach £20 million within two or three years. Naturally, the railways ask whether they are expected to subsidise this unprofitable service. Equally they appreciate that any increase in fares would push more traffic on to the roads, which is not exactly what is required.

If one discusses the problem with city planners and local authorities, one finds that they are equally aware of the situa- tion. They are concerned because it is useless to provide housing land when the rail capacity does not match it. A survey recently made in Kent showed that in every new housing estate 70 per cent. of the population were actual or potential commuter passengers. Many local authorities despair at trying to provide a counter-magnet to London. They say that industry and jobs should be brought with the overspill population, or the problem will never be solved. In other words, it is necessary to decide on a drastic form of decentralisation and reverse the present trend of employment growth in central areas. But the immediate crisis which the planners see staring them in the face is the annual increase of commuter travellers. I understand that it is something like 22,000 passengers a year on the railways, and the question is rightly asked: How can the present services absorb this increase?

When one examines the active part the Government play in this crisis, one finds it is very small. They appear to hide in the wings and urge with a very loud voice, but apparently take very little action. Surely now is the time for the Government to step in as the third partner, to co-ordinate the service and also to act in a financial capacity. The importance of co-ordinating services was again revealed in the Report on reshaping the railways. In my discussions with a Liverpool planning officer I discovered that his council had this problem. They found they could obtain no cooperation between the rail and bus services. In this case the bus companies were afraid that such co-operation would lead to the creaming off of their profitable services. Believe it or not, two of the bus companies were municipally owned. Surely the Government could take action and set up a unified transport authority for such areas. The Minister should take up two other points on this question of co-ordination. First, he should see that local authorities are given more power over transport, along with land use; and, secondly, he should see that public transport undertakings do not deliberately undercut each other and so cause both services to become uneconomic.

To turn to the financial side, the issue is simply this: is the State or is it not to subsidise these commuter services? I believe that it should and, furthermore, I believe that local authorities could help as well. If one takes an area such as may be found in Surrey, where there is a large population of commuter travellers, surely it would be right, when such populations are benefiting from low subsidised fares, that they should contribute something towards a State subsidy. I believe that this argument would be quite acceptable to the local authorities in such areas if they saw that the result would lead to an improved commuter service.

Finally, I do not feel that I can sufficiently emphasise the urgency of this problem and so perhaps I cannot do better than end with a quotation from the final sentence of the Steering Group Report. Urging the Government to take action over the growing traffic crisis, the Report went on to say: We must meet it without confusion over purpose, without timidity over means and, above all, without delay.

6.49 p.m.

THE DUKE OF DEVONSHIRE

My Lords, I am quite sure that we are grateful to my noble friend Lord Kinnoull for raising this vital subject. Some of your Lordships will have heard quite enough from me already for one evening and therefore I do not propose to detain you for more than a few moments.

We face an ever-increasing problem, with the gradual strangulation of the roads and streets in the great cities of this land. This surely must be an opportunity for the railways to ease the burden by means of a competitive and alternative method of transport; so that more of the people who now drive their cars into the cities will decide that they would get a better deal and arrive more quickly at their place of work, if they travelled by rail. This seems to me to provide a golden opportunity for the railways to strike hack. Much as I approved of the Question put down by my noble friend, I was not altogether happy when I heard him talk about a unified transport authority. I must say that it would be something at which I should look very suspiciously. I feel that if people could get to work by rail it would help those wishing to use their cars for shopping for buying weekly supplies, and all the rest of it. As my noble friend has said, the fact that people are compelled to stand in railway carriages shows that there is a demand for more accommodation.

I see this as a challenge to the railways. Things are going their way. People like to use the railways. And it is up to the railways to deliver the goods and persuade people that it is better to go by rail than go "one man, one car", because it is this which causes the chronic congestion we have in all our great cities to-day. I sincerely hope that the Government will take note of my noble friend's Question and will do all they can to stimulate the State-owned railways to meet the challenge that has been placed on their doorstep.

6.50 p.m.

LORD SOMERS

My Lords, I should like to thank my noble friend for drawing attention to this important subject tonight. Anybody who has travelled by either Underground or Southern Railway suburban services during the rush hour realises what a terrifying experience this is. Frankly, I cannot see any solution without the expenditure of an enormous amount of money, because the trains are carrying absolutely up to the limit at the moment and are running, as I have said before, almost within sight of each other, so that one cannot put more on the line. What we need are more tracks; and, of course, particularly in the case of the Underground, that is a very expensive business.

What I think might be done, just for the sake of convenience, is this. At the main line termini there could be a little more direction and controlling of passengers, so that they are not all rushing in different directions and bumping into each other. On the Underground, the supply of a few more automatic change-giving ticket machines would be useful. It is an extraordinary thing that whenever I travel by Underground and want to get a ticket from one of these machines, I find a metal plate over it saying, "Not in use". One does not necessarily have the exactly change, so more of these change-giving machines would have a great value.

VISCOUNT STONEHAVEN

My Lords, I would throw only one point into the discussion. On surface railways, if we take the cubic content of a train, we find that roughly 10 per cent. is the space allocated for seating of passengers. If we could increase that proportion to 20 per cent., which ought not to be beyond possibility and would not be very costly, we could carry twice the number of people sitting. Half of those passengers now have to stand in these trains. It is high time that a commuter carriage was designed to give more seats. People may still have to be packed like sardines—but let us have sitting sardines instead of standing sardines.

6.54 p.m.

LORD LINDGREN

My Lords, I am most grateful to the noble Earl, Lord Kinnoull, and to other noble Lords who have spoken this evening. A great many interesting points have been raised, but I am afraid that I have time to deal with only a few of them. Taking my cue from the noble Lord's Question, I propose first to try to get in perspective the present state of rail commuter services, and what the possibilities for development and improvement are. First, it must be said that both the provision of rail services and the planning of their improvements is primarily the responsibility of the operators—the Railways Board with, in London, the London Transport Board. The Government's; responsibilities are confined to matters such as investment, as the noble Earl mentioned, and rail closures; and, of course, in a wider context, the Government's regional and economic policies provide a framework within which public transport must operate. But it is the Boards who are directly responsible both for day-to-day operation and for the planning and carrying out of improvements to the rail system.

The Boards are well aware that there is serious congestion on some of the commuter rail services, but the picture is not quite so bad as it has been painted. Let us take the Provinces first. I know that the noble Earl, in his speech, paid most attention to the London services, but his Question covers the country as a whole. The position is that, outside London, peak traffic on most suburban rail lines has been falling. We asked the Railways Board for their comments on the Question we are debating to-night and they have said that, in general, they do not concede that there is in fact any increasing congestion on the commuter trains serving the big cities outside London. And this emphasises the noble Earl's point that London is the big problem. For example, in Glasgow, which is second only to London in the volume of suburban rail traffic, the Board say that, although some standing occurs over relatively short distances, the trains are not overcrowded and conditions are tolerable. On the occasions of one-day bus strikes in Glasgow, and when other surface transport has been disrupted by fog, carryings on the Glasgow commuter services have increased by 25 per cent. This shows that the physical capacity is there.

In fact—and this is a point I want to emphasise—the provincial rail services are faced with quite another problem than congestion. Their main difficulty is that on many lines there are not enough people travelling to cover the costs of providing the services. On some of these lines the commuter traffic is substantial and cannot be catered for other than by rail. That is why my right honourable friend refused consent to the closure of the Manchester—Bury electric service and of the service from Glasgow to Edinburgh, via Shotts. Thus, outside London, it is not a question of making plans for relieving congestion on the commuter rail services. Rather, the congestion is on the roads, and rail services may be needed to relieve this congestion. A major rôle for public transport is to provide for the bulk of journeys to work in the central areas of large cities; and where there is a substantial volume of commuter traffic, rail transport has large advantages over road transport.

We believe that long-term plans for the rail services in each urban area should be based on a study of the transport needs for all purposes and by all forms of transport in the area. Studies of this kind are in progress, or planned for all the big conurbations. Their method is first to establish the requirements of the passenger movement in future years, taking into account the growth of, and any shifts in, population and employment. Then plans can be made, embracing rail, road and bus, for an effective passenger transport system to cope with commuter and other needs.

If I may turn to London, on which the main emphasis has been placed this evening, congestion is severe on many services. Many of us know from personal experience the appalling crush on some of the trains at the height of peak. But let us first look at the problem from the operators' point of view. They have been faced with a steadily increasing number of commuters who are travelling longer distances and concentrating their journeys into a shorter peak period of travel. During the 'fifties employment in Central London increased at a rate of something like 20,000 each year. At the same time, road congestion became worse and prevented the buses from taking their proper share in the increased load. The net result has been a growth in rail commuting by train and Underground during the last twelve years from 750,000 to 900,000 each day.

At the same time, there has been a drift of population away from London to beyond the Green Belt: the population of the outer part of the London Passenger Transport area increased by 550,000 during this period. And with an increasingly standardised day, the concentration in the peak is worse than it was. Within the peak hour on British Railways there is even a super-peak of twenty minutes which accounts for 40 to 50 per cent. of the total traffic. To deal with 40 to 50 per cent. of the traffic within twenty minutes, with this density of traffic, is a headache for those who have to operate it. In spite of this increase in demand, many services are far better than they were. It is easy, and natural, for the frustrated traveller of to-day to look back nostalgically to a rosy past. But, so far as most London commuters are concerned, this rosy past is pure imagination. Liverpool Street and Fenchurch Street may not be heavens on earth, but would anyone choose to go back to the old steam services on those two lines, daily miracle though the service may have been from an operational point of view?

There have been many other striking improvements. For example, in the rolling stock on the Central, Piccadilly and Metropolitan Lines; the new trains carry l5 per cent. more people and are much more comfortable. And in the Kent services, to which the noble Earl referred (and, as he said, they are the most crowded of all), the Railways Board have done what they can to increase capacity by lengthening platforms and, providing ten-car instead of eight-car trains. Many more improvements are in hand. Most notable of these is, of course, the Victoria Line, due for completion in three years' time. This new Tube will enable many journeys to be made more directly and quickly, and will give considerable relief to some of the most congested parts of the existing Underground system.

The noble Earl, quite rightly, not only emphasised the present, but asked: what of the future? What are the future plans to relieve congestion on the London commuter services'? The Railyway Plan for London was prepared by a joint Working, Party of British Railways and London Transport, was was submitted to my right honourable friend in March of this year. The main proposals are for three extensions to the Underground system—the Victoria Line extension to Brixton, the Fleet Line, and the Aldwych-Waterloo Line, and minor railway works to increase capacity. The estimated cost of this London Plan as submitted is over £125 million. The plan is a tentative one. Noble Lords may have read the evidence of the Select Committee on London Transport, paragraph 472, in which it is said of the largest item in the plan: The Fleet line lies further ahead. The Board stressed that it needs much more work. They have not completed the survey for the lines and they must have further discussions with the Planning Authorities concerned. Only then could the Board decide whether or not to recommend the Government to approve it. At present the delaying factor was the work that they themselves had to do; no out-side body was holding it up. In view of the tentative nature of the plan, and the uncertainty of some of the assumptions underlying it, my right honourable friend asked the Board not to give it general publication. The plan has, of course, been available as a working document to the authorities concerned with transport planning in London and the South East. In view of the work yet to be done, the plan as a whole cannot be acted on immediately. But two of the proposals in it—the Aldwych—Waterloo Line and the Victoria Line extension to Brixton—have been developed in detail and formally submitted to my right honourable friend, who is now considering them. I hope that his consideration will not be as long as that of the previous Government in regard to the Victoria Line.

In the long term, the elimination of congestion on the rail commuter services in London requires, as the noble Earl has suggested, a co-operative effort from Government, local authorities and the Transport Boards. In the Government's view, transport cannot be planned in isolation from town planning as a whole, and this, to be successful, must take account of a number of important factors—land use, employment, and population, to name the most important. One of this Government's earliest actions was to put a stop on office building in the metropolitan area. That should at least check the continuing growth of employment in London. The Boards have been working together on possible further developments of London's railway systems to follow the Victoria Line. Their plans will have to be considered together with road proposals as part of a coordinated transport plan for London. The Government are determined that public transport in London, of which the commuter rail services are an important part, should be developed so as to meet the needs of a great city and provide a high standard of service to all those who live and work in it.

The noble Earl asked three other questions, which I took down. The first was in regard to a subsidy for commuter services. With great respect to the noble Earl—and we are all grateful to him for the manner in which he introduced the debate—this really is outside the general scope of this debate. But, as I have indicated during my speech, outside the London area, and in some cases inside the London area, commuter rail services do lose money, and, therefore, in the deficiency grant which the Government pay to the Railways Board there is a subsidy to the traveller. So far as London is concerned, Londoners will know that the Board's financial problems have been the subject of urgent study by the Government, and a statement will soon be made about London Transport fares.

The noble Earl referred to the powers of local authorities as transport authorities, and though I do not want to widen the gap between the noble Earl and his noble friend the Duke of Devonshire, I must say that I entirely agree with the noble Earl that when local authorities operate bus services, many of them running duplicate services in each other's area by agreement, there is perhaps a tendency to overlap. We agree that you cannot plan transport for a conurbation on the basis purely of local authority operation of bus services within that area. We take the view that, as a result of the transportation studies which are now taking place, some changes in organisation in the conurbations may be necessary. I hope that we shall have the co-operation of local authorities in this matter, although it means a diminution of certain local authority functions as they are at present. We are considering transport for the people, and transport area authorities over an area.

I was sorry to hear what the noble Earl said about the Liverpool experiment, because I have always understood from one report I have seen that the Working Party in the Liverpool and Mersey area were securing a great deal of cooperation, and in the Ministry we have high hopes that something tangible will come from that report.

The noble Earl raised the question of duplication of services. Of course, in urban areas we must have at least some duplication. For instance, London Transport run buses over the whole length of Oxford Street, while underneath runs the Central Line. They perform two different functions, surface transport being much more for the short journey, whereas the Tube train carries people on longer journeys. All fares are governed by the Transport Tribunal in London, and outside London bus fares are controlled by the traffic commissioners. Personally—and this is only a personal point of view—I do not know of any fares which are deliberately lowered in order that there can be competition between road and rail services. If the noble Earl has any such examples, we shall be only too pleased to look at them. Whilst we at the Ministry cannot do anything about them, we can, of course, pass them on to the traffic commissioners, who will look at them in the light of operations in the area.

The noble Lord, Lord Somers, referred to the automatic ticket machines of London Transport. This method would be better if everybody was honest. But from personal experience I can tell the noble Lord that the number of people who try to get Tube tickets with milk checks in those automatic machines, and who interfere with the mechanism, is considerable. London Transport are at the moment considering a much bigger extension of automatic ticket issuing. They are also looking at automatic signaling and also other things under a general mechanization policy, but we hope that all developments will be to the benefit of the public.