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Irish Jesuit Province
The Milne Report on Transport in IrelandAuthor(s): John KingSource: The Irish Monthly, Vol. 77, No. 908 (Feb., 1949), pp. 54-60Published by: Irish Jesuit ProvinceStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/20515933 .
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THE MILNE REPORT ON TRANSPORT IN IRELAND
By JOHN KING
THE transport problem in Ireland has been in existence since
the first railway was built, and although in the last 100 years numerous commissions were set up in an effort to solve the
problem, no real progress was ever made. In 1948 a fresh effort was made to find a solution when Sir James Milne was appointed to review the position of rail, canal and road transport in Ireland
and to report on the steps necessary to secure the co-ordination of
the various transport agencies and to produce an efficient and
economic transport system. Within five months of the appointment of Sir James Milne he and his colleagues have produced a report which is a tribute to their ability, efficiency and industry. The
Report contains a survey of the present transport situation in the
country, a detailed examination of the operations, administration
and policy of Coras Iompair Eireann, and recommendations as to
how an efficient and economic transport system can be built on the
present tottering structure.
Most people will disagree with one or more of the recommendations as to future policy which are contained in the Report, but this is
only natural because there would be no problem if the solution were
obvious. The essential feature of a difficult problem is that any one of a number of courses may seem to provide a probable solution, and some of these may ultimately solve the problem without neces
sarily being the best or the correct course.
An analysis of the detailed examination of the affairs and policy of Coras Iompair Eireann which is contained in the Report is beyond the scope of this article. In considering this part of the Report
which undoubtedly shows that the affairs of the Company are in a serious condition the critic should consider very carefully the con
ditions under which Coras Iompair Eireann was formed, and has
been carried on, before passing judgment on the management. The
Company took over a railway system which for a number of years before the war had been unable properly to maintain its permanent
way, works or rolling stock and which had borne all the stress
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THE MILNE REPORT
imposed by five years of the emergency. The shortage of fuel and
the unsatisfactory quality of such fuel as was available, and the
inability to carry out normal maintenance work on the equipment had disastrous effects on the efficiency and earning capacity of the
system. Due to adverse operating conditions passenger train miles
worked had fallen from 5,714,523 in 1939 to 1,716,072 in 1945, and
passenger train miles per hour had fallen from 18.31 in 1939 to 13.51
in 1945.
Since the Company took over control it has had to contend not
only with the continuing effects of the war, but also with a strike of
its bus employees and a strike in the sugar factories which deprived it of valuable beet traffic. The fuel has deteriorated in quality and
is far short of the performance standard of pre-war coal and its
price has increased by over 140 per cent. Such materials as are
available for the maintenance and repair of the permanent way and
rolling stock have reached almost prohibitive prices and are far
from the best quality. Wages have increased to such an extent as
to form the major item in railway expenditure. In 1939 wages repre sented about 51 per cent, of railway costs as compared with
60 per cent, in 1947, and what will be a much higher percentage in
1948.
The Report contains one implied criticism of the capital expen diture at present being incurred by Coras Iompair Eireann which
cannot be let go without comment. It is implied in the Report that
the capital expenditure involved in the erection of the long-distance bus terminal at Store Street, Dublin, should not have been incurred at the present time, having regard to the financial position of the
Company. Dublin is the capital of a country which is trying to turn
itself into a tourist resort, and at the same time Dublin is the centre
from which all major long-distance bus routes radiate. Both tourists and the mere Irish, while waiting for long-distance buses, deserve to receive protection from the elements and a place where they can wait with some degree of comfort. The thousands of people
who have shivered in bus queues on Aston's Quay for the last seven or eight years can testify as to the necessity for a proper
bus terminal. It must not be forgotten that such a terminal cannot be added to at will like a meccano model and that it is always cheaper to do a job well if it is being done at all. For these reasons
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IRISH MONTHLY
Coras Iompair Eireann does appear to be justified in this capital
expenditure despite its delicate financial position. The recommendations designed to provide an economic, efficient
and co-ordinated transport system are rightly based on the premise that the railways should be the principal and dominant partner in
any such system. The ability of the railways to move large quan tities of freight and large numbers of passengers over long distances
and at high speeds without any corresponding increase in operating costs, and the fact that they represent a heavy fixed capital expen diture which must be written off as a total loss if the railways are
abandoned makes the railways the principal transport agency.
Furthermore, the Milne Report makes it clear that the Irish roads
are not fit to carry all the freight and passenger traffic, or the large modern freight vehicles which would become necessary, if the rail
ways were scrapped. It is estimated that an annual expenditure of
?30,000,000 would be required to improve the roads to, and maintain
them at, a standard which would ensure that all traffic could be
carried safely and efficiently. The basic principle of railway economics
is that all permanent way and rolling stock should receive the max
imum use all the time, and to ensure this the Milne Report recom
mends that railway operated road services should be used merely as ancillary or complementary to the railway services and that where
possible long-distance railway-owned road services which compete with the railway proper should not be continued.
It is refreshing to find that the authors of the Milne Report, who
are men with practical transport experience, favour the retention of
the branch railway lines. At all times the abandonment of branch
lines is a retrograde step as it represents a loss of fixed capital which cannot be replaced. Branch lines play an important part in railway economy as feeders to the main line services, and lines which show no profit on their own working prove to be profit-earning services
when the receipts which they bring to the main lines are taken into
account. This is demonstrated in the Milne Report by reference to the ten branch-line services operated by Coras Iompair Eireann.
These ten lines are estimated to show a loss in respect of the work
ing on the branches, the loss varying from ?930 in the case of the
Ballaghadereen branch to ?23,312 in the case of the Cavan and Leitrim
Railway. At the same time the estimated contributory value of the
traffic brought by these branch lines to the main line is ?325,163,
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THE MILNE REPORT
the contribution varying from ?4,260 in the case of the Banagher lines to ?75,427 in the case of the Valent?a branch.
The Report recommends that the new transport system be built
around a reconstituted Coras lompair Eireann. This new Company which would operate all public transport services in the country should have two additional directors who would be nominated by the
Government and who would have the right to veto capital expenditure. One of these new directors would be representative of labour. The
chairman of the Company would be deprived of his present powers and responsibilities and the responsibility for the administration of
the Company would be vested in the Board of Directors as a whole.
This new Company should then acquire the undertaking of the
Grand Canal Company. The Company and the Ulster Transport
Authority should jointly acquire the undertaking of the Great
Northern Company and of those minor lines which operate cross
border services. The fixed assets of these undertakings situate on
either side of the Border would be taken over by the Company and
the Ulster Transport Authority respectively, but they would be used
by the Great Northern Railway with a Board of Directors nominated
by the Company and the Ulster Transport Authority. The receipts and expenditure of all the cross-border lines would be divided on the
basis that, subject to an arbitrary allocation of receipts and expen diture relating to through services each party would retain the revenue
from and bear the direct costs of services within its own territory. The Company should concentrate on developing railways, provid
ing new and up-to-date rolling stock and equipment so as to give a
more frequent and rapid rail service for passengers and freight. Rail
way-owned motor services outside urban areas, both freight and
passenger, should be used merely as ancillary to the railways, pro
viding collection and delivery services and zonal services from central
rail-heads to local destinations and in places where the railway is
unduly circuitous. Rates for carriage by rail with collection and
delivery by road should be made sufficiently attractive to traders.
Independent road operators for reward should be restricted to local
services, to services in specified areas and to routes where they would
not compete with existing railways and canals. Contractual arrange ments should be made by the railways with these independent road
operators with a view to providing services in those areas not served
by railways and at the same time acting as a feeder service for the
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IRISH MONTHLY
railways. These operators should also be encouraged to provide services to meet local requirements.
The right of the private trader to use his own vehicles for the
carriage of his own goods is recognised, but it is suggested that this
right should be subject to such conditions as would prevent unfair
competition with the public services and that the interest of the indivi
dual trader should be subordinated to the interest of the public. In
order to secure this a new system of licensing is suggested whereby local licences paying a standard rate of duty should be issued which
would permit the vehicle to be used within a radius of fifteen miles
with such extension as the licensing authority having regard to local
circumstances should decide, and general licences, on which duty at double the standard rate would be payable, which would permit the vehicle to be used all over the country.
The Report states that the railways and canals bear an undue pro
portion of the cost of maintaining what are described in the Report as "the highways", that is to say, the permanent way and works
of the railways, the waterways and other works of the canals, and
the roads, as they have to maintain their own permanent way and
waterways and at the same time contribute to the cost of the upkeep of the roads.
It is proposed that a Central Highways Authority be set up which
would assume financial responsibility for the maintenance and renewal
of the railway permanent ways and works, of the canal banks, docks,
bridges, etc., and of the roads. The ownership of the railway tracks
and of the waterways would remain with the existing Companies and
the actual maintenance and renewal works would be carried out by them subject to the approval of the Central Highways Authority and
merely as agents for the Central Highways Authority. This authority would acquire the revenue to finance maintenance and renewal of
the highways by collecting a uniform charge per pound of the gross
receipts derived by the railways and canals from the conveyance of
passengers and freight and from road users by licence and fuel duties.
The licence duty on all road vehicles should be charged at a stan
dard rate of tax, and there should also be a tax on the oil fuel con
sumed by the vehicle which tax would tend to equate the amount
of tax paid by a vehicle to the use it made of the roads.
The first objection that can be made to this scheme concerns the
proposal that Coras Iompair Eireann should acquire the Grand Canal
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THE MILNE REPORT
Company. The operating problems and practice of railways are
entirely different from canals, and the work of operating the canals
requires a specialised experience and knowledge which the present staff have. The two forms of transport are not really competitive as the canal derives its main traffic revenue from classes of goods where speed of transport is less important than the reduced costs
of conveyance. The Grand Canal Company fulfils a very useful
purpose in transporting freight such as ale, porter, artificial manures, animal feeding-stuffs, turf, timber, firewood and coke, and it serves
a number of towns which are not served by a railway such as Kil
beggan, Stradbally, Rathangan, Portumna, Scariff, Eyrecourt, Wood
ford and Lanesborough. There is a real danger that if the Grand
Canal is worked as a department of Coras Iompair Eireann it will
be neglected and allowed to decay and a transport artery which
proved its value during the emergency will be lost to the country. The example of the Royal Canal must not be forgotten. This canal was acquired by a railway company in 1845 at a time when it carried a traffic of 112,181 tons and now the annual traffic on it does not
exceed 1,000 tons. In 1847 the Grand Canal carried 290,000 tons, and in 1947 it carried over 155,000 tons by canal and 43,404 tons by road.
The interests of the nation demand that the Canal Company should
preserve its entity and should operate as an independent unit. If
the method of relieving the Canal Company of portion of the burden
of maintaining the highways is adopted, and the restrictions on its
charging rights are modified, then there is no reason why the canal
should not continue as an economic unit supplementing the co
ordinated system of transport rather than competing with it.
The proposal that two Government nominees act as directors of
Coras Iompair Eireann and that the Central Highway Authority take
over financial responsibility for the maintenance of the highways will
not prove satisfactory. This gives the State power to interfere with
the internal working of a private company without giving the com
pany the full benefit of the credit or of the financial resources of the
State. The maintenance of the way and works of a railway system is too closely related to the operation problems of the system to have
them carried out satisfactorily by two independent bodies. The
division of responsibility will lead to confusion and disputes as to the
necessity for particular expenditure and will result in the public not
being able to fix responsibility on either authority. 59
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IRISH MONTHLY
As the Report says, a prerequisite for an efficient transport system is financial stability and no solution of the Irish transport problem can be found until this financial stability can be found. The root of
the Irish transport problem is that the country has an over-elaborate
transport system while its natural resources have not been developed to an extent sufficient to maintain the system in a proper state of
efficiency. Two thousand four hundred miles of railway, 415 miles
of canal and 49,000 miles of road cater for a population of about
3,000,000 of whom over 500,000 are concentrated in Dublin City. The railway and canal systems were designed and constructed at a
time when the population of the country exceeded 6,500,000. In
consequence of these facts the amount of traffic which was available
was never sufficient to give a reasonable return on the capital invested.
At present it seems that a very heavy expenditure will be necessary to provide proper facilities for traffic, and facilities which will pro
mote more traffic.
The railway system is a national asset which must be preserved in the interest of the nation. If the necessary financial stability can
not be secured without State interference, then it is the duty of the
State to take over the ownership and operation of Coras lompair Eireann. A programme spread over a number of years and involv
ing a heavy capital expenditure is required in order to put the system and its ancillary services on a proper working basis. This pro
gramme is beyond the means of the Company without State aid, and
will require the full resources of the State. The proper course would
be for the State to take over the Company, and develop the scheme
for co-ordination contained in the Milne Report with the modifications
outlined above.
30th December, 1948.
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