Suchergebnisse

First railways, then buses and taxis and, for a time, road freight – there has for many years been a tendency to treat transport as a utility, and nowhere more so than in the provision of roads. This article calls for the return of all forms of inland surface transport to the market.

The Transport Act 1985 provided for light control of bus services in the UK, and for privatisation. Since 1997 there has been growing pressure for re‐regulation, especially from the Passenger Transport Authorities in the former Metropolitan Counties. Steps toward this were taken in the Transport Act 2000. Now we have the Local Transport Act 2008, which could provide for this to be taken further; a Statutory Contract Scheme would enable the Integrated Transport Authority to remove commercial decision‐making from bus operators and end all competition. Other parts of the new Act would allow further steps in the same direction. This article argues that its application should be carefully watched and criticised.

After seeking to placate the local government lobby while retaining the benefits of private enterprise, the Labour government's policy for bus services is slipping into a dangerous compromise which will neglect the market while seizing assets from commercial operators. Behind this lies a policy leading to the return of bus services to public ownership.

The common assumption that transport is a special case, an industry that is inherently proper for state intervention and control, if not ownership, is examined and questioned in the light of its history and contemporary legislation. An earlier version was presented at a meeting of the Edmund Burke Institute in Dublin in 1989.