MORE STATE BUSES

Evening Post, Volume CIV, Issue 145, 16 December 1927, Page 10

MORE STATE BUSES

A DOZEN IN ALL

LICENSES APPLIED FOR

CITY HAS NO OBJECTION

Six uiore buses, making twelve in all, are to be placed on tho Hutt road, on the Mandel Block-Welliug-ton service, by the Bailway Department. It is proposed to reduce train services to some extent, but whether train tickets, including quarterly and season tickets, would be available on buses during hours train services are reduced was not made clear.

The Bylaws Committee recommended that tho application of the Eailway Board to run six motor-omnibuses in the Mandel Block-Wellington service be approved." Councillor Luekic said that they-had already granted tho Eailway Board licenses for six buses on that run. Biucc then, and since the last committee meeting, a letter requiring the immediate attention of tho council had been received from the board, asking for a further six. licenses, and stating in the letter that when these wero' running the number of trains would bo,reduced. The Bailway Department, as a Government body, was not under any obligation to apply to tho council for permission at all, but in its desire to put itself on a similar footing to private bodies, it was taking the course it had to protect a public sprvice, by increasing its motor side of it. It' was vital to the Department that the permission should be given before tho Christmas holidays. He moved that no objection be placed to the running by the Railway Department of six additional buses applied for in its letter of the 12th instant, and that the matter of formally granting the licenses be considered at the next meeting of the committee. As notice kad not yet been given of the application to other bus -proprietors the licenses could not be granted forthwith.

WHY SPECIAL TREATMENT? Councillor Hislop looked at things in a different way. The Government should be treated the same as anybody else, that was, the same as. a private company. The Department could choose for itself. It could either run without licenses or apply for licenses, but in either case the application for licenses should bo treated in the same way as if from a private body. The Government should receive no favours. .-Councillor H. D. Bennett said that the committee had been told by the Department that it intended to pay the council the ordinary fees find comply with all the council's conditions, just as a private owner. If tho licenses had been for twelve licenses instead of six they would have been granted in tho same way. The Department could quite welL run the buses without the council's permission, if it wished, but it was willing to pay all the fees. Why should the council object? It was only that' they were not likely to meet again before the holidays that tho matter had been brought up. . Councillor Mitchell asked if the committee could go into the question of whether the buses were needed, just as they would in the case of private buses? Councillors: "Yes." Councillor Mitchell: "In the event of private services asking the same licenses on the same run they would not have been granted." • Councillor Hislop: "That is so." ,' ;) CHANGES OF FRONT. Councillor Luckie: "In the case of Ingham's buses we were told repeatedly that the services were sufficient, but i eventually we granted six instead of three licenses, and when three more licenses were sought we were given plenty of evidence that they were needed. The evidence apparently varied according to the needs of the bus proprietors. Now the Railway Department wants twelve licenses, and they propose to reduce the train service. The trains are running at a loss, and they can run the buses at a profit. We should offer no objection, and let them renew their application in January." | The-Mayor: "An interim permission now and the licenses later; nobody can object to that."

. Councillor M'Villy asked why the council should grant additional licenses, oven temporarily, before inquiring whether additional buses were required. The bus proprietors whose machines were on the road should receive consideration. It was wrong in principle to grant licenses as had been proposed. The effect of granting more licenses would have the effect of decreasing the value of the goodwill of the present-ser-vices.

NOT FAIR PRACTICE. A cut-rate war between the services was coming, said Councillor W. J. Gaudin, and that at the expense of the general taxpayer. The State had no right to come in and create such a state of things. Every man had a right to $am a living, and the State had no right to turn him out of that living without giving him a fair chance. The Railwey Department had offered a price far below- the valuation of the services witlj a threat that if the offer was not accepted the machines would be run off the road. Ho, as one member of the Licensing Authority, was not going to tolerate what would not be tolerated from private enterprise. Councillor Mitchell:'"lf a private individual or company made the samo application, would it be granted?" Councillor Luckio: "No."

Councillor Mitchell: "Then it is not a question of justice; it is merely a formality.'' THE WOODEN PLOUGH. The makers of the law were them- . selves asking permission to break it, said Councillor Semple; they were seeking a way by which they would be im- ] mune from.a law under which they were persecuting others. i "One had to go back to the beginning to find the weak link, continued Councillor Semple. The Government would not then entertain the idea of bus services, but was determined to go on with an antiquated train service. Others came in with the modern method and met the needs of the people. Now the Government came to the council and asked for assistance in overcoming a difficulty which had been created by the Government's own short-sightedness. ' My father ploughed with a wooden plough, a wooden plough is good enough for me": that was apparently the attitude of the Government. He held no brief for private enterprise, and ho believed that it would bo a good thing for the country were all transport services under State or municipal control, but at the same time it was not fair to allow a business to grow up without hindranco and then to endeavour to kill it. i ■

AN IMPORTANT JOINT. Councillor J. Burns raised a point of very considerable importance to those who rogularly use midday or slack-hour trains. It was intimated by tho Railway Department, he said, that the train service would be reduced: would train tiekcts then be available for use on Government buses? It was not possible that that would be so, replied Councillor Luckie. The point was very important, said Councillor Semple, particularly to holders of quarterly or other season tickets, for all such train passengers did not travel during rush hours, and if no train

ran to suit them they would be forced to use buses, at a very much higher fare. Councillor M'Villy remarked that workers' tickets were issued at 2s 6d per week for use before 8 a.m. and after 9 a.m. Would people who held such tickets be entitled to use them on the buses when the trains they were accustomed to use were taken off?

Obviously no, replied Councillor Luckie. It was plainly impossible to expect the buses to handle peak loads. The only trains that would be taken off were those in the middle of the day. No one had suggested that there should be such interehangeability of railway bus and railway tickets, but it was, of course, possible that such an arrangement could be made, but 'that was solely a matter for the Railway Department.

Councillor Hislop: "Surely these are the very things that should come before us before licenses aro granted."

Replying to further questions, Councillor Luckie said that if there were no Government applications the council would be favourably inclined towards a private application, but preference would under the circumstances be given to the Government application in. order that State services should be protected. Councillor Luckie's motion was carried by eight votes to seven:—Ayes: The Mayor, Councillors H. D. Bennett, W. H. Bennett, Burn, Burns, Hugginsj Luckie, Meadowcroft. Noes: Councillors Aston, Gaudin, Hislop, Mitchell, M'Villy, Semple, and Morpeth."