Manawatu Evening Standard. TUESDAY, AUGUST 16, 1927. THE MOTOR BUS REGULATIONS.

Manawatu Standard, Volume XLVII, Issue 221, 16 August 1927, Page 6

Manawatu Evening Standard. TUESDAY, AUGUST 16, 1927. THE MOTOR BUS REGULATIONS.

Experience of tlieir working should have demonstrated to the Government long ere ,this the imperative necessity for so amending the motor bus regulations as to ensure to the public the benefit of the motor and bus services that have proved of such considerable value and convenience to those using them. It is not alone in the city that the Motor Omnibus Traffic Act is operating harshly to the proprietors of motor services and to the inconvenience of the public generally for, as the deputation that waited upon the local Chamber of Commerce at its last meeting pointed out, some of the regulations made under the Act are simply unworkable. One such regulation, referred to by Mr Smillie, in its application to a district such as this, where the roads are liable to be flooded, is simply absurd; because it declares that, in procuring licenses, the applicants must define the roads over which they desire to run, thus making it almost impracticable for service cars to deviate from their defined routes. It is true that the necessity for making such deviations may be of rare occurrence, but there have been occasions within the last few years when the necessity has arisen for the regular routes to be temporarily abandoned, and, in such abandonment, the owners of the service cars incur very serious risks, because another regulation invalidates the insurance if an omnibus deviates in the slightest from its defined route. The regulations also demand insurances of far too heavy an extent. Licensed buses and service cars have to insure every individual they are capable of carrying to the extent of £SOO. Thus a bus, with seating accommodation for twenty persons, lias to carry insurances to the extent of £IO,OOO. In the case of the company cited insurances on passengers have to be made to the extent of £74,000, involving the payment of an annual premium of £296 Bs, which is actually prohibitive in its effect upon the extension of the accommodation provided by companies running such service cars, as even spare

buses that are only on the road occasionally have to be covered by insurances to the full extent of their seating accommodation. Another effeci of the Act upon the running of service cars, though probably not contemplated by the Government in framing the measure, is that under a recent court decision the owners can be compelled to take out local licenses in every town they pass through, so that, on some routes, the sei*vice cars would actually have to be licensed by each of the local bodies through whose territory they pass. A car plying between New Plymouth and Wanganui, for instance, _ would need to take out five or six local licenses. If it costs over £IOO per year per bus in taxes and insurance, it is high time the Government took matters in hand and cut down what really amounts to a super-tax on this form of enterprise. When all is said and done it is the public who have to meet these charges in the last resource, and, as motor transit is now so largely used in the country districts, the high taxation forces the bus proprietors to make higher charges than would otherwise be the case, while, incidentally also, it reacts against country life by making it less endurable. "Viewed from any aspect the taxation on motor transport of all kinds appears to be unnecessarily high and is adding to the cost of living.