TRANSPORT IN LONDON

Otago Daily Times, Issue 20892, 5 December 1929, Page 9

TRANSPORT IN LONDON

GOVERNMENT’S PROPOSALS. UNIFICATION OF SERVICES. GREAT INTEREST AROUSED. (British Official Wireless.), (United Press Association.) (By Electric Telegraph—Copyright.) RUGBY, December 3. (Received Dec. 4, at 5.5 p.m.) Great interest has been aroused by the announcement made in the House of Commons by the Minister of Transport (Mr Herbert Morrison), that the Government is to draft a scheme for .the unification of- all the London traffic services under public ownership. Details of the proposals are keenly awaited, but they are not likely to be available for. some time, as the subject is to be explored at once by the Transport Ministry with all the interests concerned in the London traffic services, including the municipalities. Mr Morrison, in his statement, said that the Government agreed with the conclusions reached by the Traffic Advisory Committee, that uneconomic and unnecessary competition should he eliminated and that a far-reaching measure of unification under public control is essential to progress. The Government believes that the “ends in view could he fully achieved and public interest fully safeguarded only if the existing financial interests are consolidated by the substitution of a single and simple form of public ownership for the complicated work of the. separate interests, private and municipal, which now add so greatly to the difficulties of the situation.”

In some political quarters the view is taken that the Government contemplates the creation of a public body on the lines of the Port of London Authority to co-ordinate and control the various passenger services. In other quarters it is assumed that the creation of a public body that would buy out the existing passenger, tramway, omnibus'; and tube railway services is intended. Comment in the press and by traffic experts is reserved pending further details.