- Some practical suggestions for a new way forward
By Andrew Capes BA DipT&CP MCIT
Contents
- The Problem
- The Existing Administrative Framework
- The Proposed Administrative Framework
- The Proposed Functions and Duties of the new Authorities
- Proposed Financial Arrangements
- Summary and Conclusions
- 1.1
- Passenger transport in Britain has suffered badly from being treated as
a political and ideological football for the last fifteen years. It has been
so fragmented by deregulation and privatisation, and has had such a
difficult relationship with cash-starved and often unsympathetic local
authorities, that its very survival into the 1990s can be seen as something
of an achievement.
- 1.2
- Despite all this, it should be recognised that many bus companies have
managed to respond to the 'free' market with dramatic improvements in their
financial and business performance, and new and supportive attitudes towards
public transport are emerging everywhere in the wake of environmental crises
brought about by mass car ownership.
- 1.3
- The problem is to find a way of retaining these positive aspects whilst
at the same time creating a coherent administrative framework within which
regional passenger transport networks can flourish as a credible alternative
to the private car. The big challenge is to see how this can be done without
setting up new structures which turn out to be cumbersome, bureaucratic,
extravagant or stultifying, and which might end up working against the
interests of the public.
- 1.4
- In the following sections I describe some proposals which I believe
could achieve these ends. They would build on existing institutions and
relationships, requiring very little new legislation and no new public
money, but at the same time offering dramatic opportunities to reintroduce
the concepts of transport integration and public accountability whose loss
has been so damaging for the people of Britain.
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- 2.1
- The present administrative framework in Britain is totally unsuited to
giving public transport the universality, stability and quality of attention
it deserves. Even PTEs no longer have any statutory responsibility to
promote transport networks, although most of them do try their best with
very limited powers; and the 70% of us who do not live in London or the
metropolitan areas are without any statutory coordinating authorities at
all, as the only duty local authorities have is to 'buy in' socially
necessary bus services.
- 2.2
- The previous administration's trust in the 'market' to sort out all the
problems of public transport has been shown to have been badly misplaced,
but the bus companies' freedom of operation has had some positive results
and should not be curtailed or changed without very good reason.
- 2.3
- The PTAs/PTEs are the only organisations with enough specialist ability
and potential for political accountability to be able to take on a proper
transport co-ordinating and integrating role. The 1968 Act which set them up
has been drastically changed to take away most of their important powers,
but some do remain, such as the ability to secure socially necessary bus and
train services and to arrange for concessionary travel.
- 2.4
- Some of their former powers, particularly the ability to precept for
payment from constituent authorities and the requirement to plan for the
future, need to be reinstated; but there is no need to try to restore their
ownership of bus fleets, nor to give them back direct control over all
fares. A summary of the powers and duties I think they ought to have is
given in Section 4 below.
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- 3.1
- At present, people who live in metropolitan areas are assumed to have
passenger transport needs which are quite different from those in the rest
of Britain. Why this should be so has never been adequately explained, and
the anomaly cannot be justified. The most urgent priority therefore is to
extend the Passenger Transport Areas to cover the whole of Britain. This
would of course change their character quite extensively, but there was a
precedent for a PTE covering a large rural area in Strathclyde from 1975 to
1995.
- 3.2
- By far the most practical way to do this would be for new transport
areas to be created to coincide with the proposed new English regions,
together with Scotland and Wales. Powers exist in the 1968 Act for the
Secretary of State to define new Passenger Transport areas; if they are
thought to be too large, they could (as happened in Strathclyde) be
subdivided for administrative convenience.
- 3.3
- In line with their geographical significance, the new Authorities should
be re-named as Regional Transport Authorities and Executives. The Executives
should be encouraged to retain and develop any current marketing identities
such as Centro, Metro and Nexus, and the balance between political and
executive power established by the 1968 Act should be restored.
- 3.4
- In London, where a completely different statutory framework exists at
present, some special arrangements will be needed; but changes there should
be aimed at bringing London and the new Regional Authorities broadly in line
with each other in terms of powers, duties and financing, though London may
always need some special additional provisions.
- 3.5
- This move could also offer the longer-term future prospect of expansion
to absorb the full transport and planning powers of the present regional
Government offices, with the advantage of supplying a ready-made regional
dimension of political accountability throughout Britain.
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- 4.1
- If the new Authorities and Executives are to function properly, they
must have real powers and duties, including the power to precept revenue
from constituent local authorities. This power must be legitimised by a
proper political authority, as was done from 1968 until the rules were
changed in 1986. The arrangement worked well during this time, and there
seems to be no reason why it should not be reinstated in a suitably modified
form.
- 4.2
- In order to avoid duplication of responsibilities, all existing levels
of involvement by local authorities in public transport should be
transferred to the new Authorities (although local Agency agreements could
certainly be encouraged, in much the same way as local agreements for road
maintenance exist).
- 4.3
- At the same time, the new Authorities should become the Registration
Authorities for bus services, taking this function from the Traffic
Commissioners, who would then be responsible only for the safety aspects of
passenger transport operation. The Traffic Commissioners' role in handling
registrations has rarely been more than that of a glorified (and often not
very efficient) filing clerk, and there seems to be no sense in keeping this
additional tier of bureaucracy once there is a Transport Authority covering
every region of Britain.
- 4.4
- The primary obligations of the newly constituted Regional Transport
Authorities and Executives should therefore become:
- planning and investment in improvements to the passenger transport
network, with special attention to the cost-effectiveness of capital
expenditure in attracting people to travel by public transport instead of by
car. This would also include an obligation to provide and maintain bus stops
and shelters throughout the Transport Authority's area;
- marketing and information, with special attention to promoting
the network in the Transport Authority's area as a whole. This would include
an obligation to provide and sell all-operator area-wide and zonal travel
tickets, and to supply comprehensive timetables and enquiry services using
the most efficient technology available;
- securing of socially necessary bus services. This is quite
effectively handled now, and there does not seem to be much reason to change
the legislative background. However, the expansion of the areas covered to
include local authorities who may have differing systems and practices will
need to be carefully studied.
- securing of local and regional rail services. This needs
significant changes, to take into account the much wider geographical areas
covered by the new Authorities. It would be possible for them to handle all
the regional railway companies' franchises, leaving only the InterCity
companies to be dealt with by OPRAF. A proper form of agreement with
Railtrack needs to be reached, to take into account changes and improvements
to rail infrastructure.
- organising and securing of education transport, a very much
more extensive responsibility in many non metropolitan areas than the PTEs
have been used to handling. Much of the expertise in this area would be
drawn from local authorities, and it might be particularly suitable for
agency operation.
- securing concessionary travel for pensioners and others,
including children. Although there does not need to be much change to the
primary legislation covering this, there does need to be a change to
standardise the entitlement of individuals to concessionary travel. This
would mean that, regardless of where they live, pensioners ought to have a
standard pass
entitling them to travel at locally prevailing concessionary fares anywhere
in Britain.
- maintaining the registration of all bus services in accordance with
the provisions of the 1985 Transport Act, in place of the Traffic
Commissioners. This would eliminate the extensive duplication of information
which occurs at present. Powers should be given to the new Authorities to
require all registrations to be submitted in a standard prescribed form, and
also to be able to refuse registration of services which do not meet certain
clearly defined criteria. Arguments against this move which used to have
some force when PTEs had extensive bus fleets of their own are no longer
valid.
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- 5.1
- There would be some changes to the way in which these proposals would be
financed compared with present arrangements, but the overall net changes in
public cost would be small. As has already been suggested, precepting powers
should be restored to the new Authorities and this would be the main source
of finance for planning, securing of services, education transport,
concessionary fares and the costs of administration.
- 5.2
- Capital expenditure would be financed by a mixture of public and private
funds and loan authorisation, very much as at present, but without the
crippling requirements for compulsory private finance which were imposed by
the previous government.
- 5.3
- The marketing and information function, as well as the costs of
administering bus service registrations, could be financed by a levy on each
service registration, perhaps charged on the basis of the peak vehicle
requirement - for example, a charge of £50 for each peak vehicle needed on a
registration could be made. This would be a simple, fair and readily
verifiable method of charging for an important new set of requirements.
- 5.4
- The additional costs of running the new expanded regional Authorities
would also be partly offset by substantial savings in two main areas. First,
local authorities would no longer need to maintain a separate public
transport tendering and contracting role, nor would they need to have any
direct involvement in paying for concessionary fares, education transport,
information and bus stops and shelters; secondly, the transfer of the
Traffic Commissioners' registration role would save a substantial amount of
currently duplicated administration costs.
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- 6.1
- This paper recommends that extensive reforms should be made to the way
passenger transport is provided in Britain (the comments do not refer to
Northern Ireland). They centre on a proposal to expand the present Passenger
Transport Authorities and Executives to cover the whole of Britain by
Regional areas, and to make extensive changes to their powers and duties,
although the existing commercial freedom of privatised bus operators would
be very largely retained.
- 6.2
- The new Regional Transport Authorities would take over all the functions
of the existing PTEs, together with some from local authorities and the
Traffic Commissioners. They would become the Registration Authorities for
their areas, and would have a number of new powers and duties in relation to
public transport. Some of the money they would need would be provided by a
levy on bus service registrations, but most would be raised by precept from
the constituent local authorities.
- 6.3
- Being Regional authorities with a substantial degree of political
accountability, the new Authorities would have the potential to develop
further into all-purpose regional authorities, taking over responsibility
for the present regional government functions of roads and economic
planning. This could well be a first step towards developing meaningful
regional authorities without adding the much-feared additional tier to
existing structures of local government.
© 1997 Andrew Capes BA DipT&CP MCIT
This text may not be reproduced without the express
permission of the author.
Andrew Capes was formerly a Passenger Transport Coordinator with
Durham County Council. He is now an independent Chartered Transport
Consultant, based in Newcastle upon Tyne.
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Electric Soup © I.W.Logan MCIT 1998. Last updated: 11 Jul 98 at
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