As we approach the 25th anniversary of deregulation, here’s the fourth post on the subject
With the 25th anniversary of deregulation approaching in a month from now, it’s hard not to wonder just where the years have gone. And time to reflect upon some thoughts of an era that doesn’t appear that long ago.
Like remembering how we all felt that the National Bus Company and the new passenger transport executives seemed so *permanent*. They weren’t. The totally nationalised sector lasted from 1968 till 1986, so that’s 17 years to deregulation’s 25 and counting.
For it was in 1968 that the half of the English territorial bus industry in private hands (BET) joined the half under the State’s Transport Holding Company (Tilling). Add in municipal control, and virtually all bus services in England were the responsibility of the government, national or local, directly or indirectly. It was following the Transport Act 1968 that in 1969 we saw territorial operators consolidate into NBC and many northern municipals into the PTEs.
And even if you were uncertain about such permanence then, there came the expansion of the PTEs in 1974 and NBC’s bus and coach corporate images of 1972 (with a national TV campaign of limited merit). The tide had turned and would never flow back. Or so we thought. But, as the late 1970s problems rolled over to the early 1980s political change, there began a slow realisation that the current system could never last...
So, with the steady freeing of bonds came the gradual self-discovery of the early 1980s, when NBC began to unbend. It allowed subsidiaries’ coaching units to adopt local colour in the Venetian blind style. It allowed a minority of subsidiaries to choose the hitherto forbidden blue, long since out of favour.
From 1986 to about 1993, there followed something of a Prague Spring, a full awakening into a profusion, even a riot, of local identities and colours. That didn’t last long, either, but even then, few people at the time predicted the rise and rise of the Big Five, even though that is the sort of agglomeration that kinda happened back in the 1920s & 1930s. It seems a world away from life in the 1970s when the future was a sea of red & green and white, under NBC.
Monday, 26 September 2011
Silver Jubilee—4
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12 comments:
Reverse the 8 and 6 to get 6 and 8 and then it's Mary Hopkins appropriately singing:
Those were the days, my friend
We thought they'd never end
We'd sing and dance forever and a day (-:
It was pretty much a disaster. London Country buses just disintegrate with Lnondon Country North East being the worst
They were so bad that TfL called in their contracts overnight and Grey Green ended up running most of them with coaches & no ticket machines
"The totally nationalised sector lasted from 1968 until 1986, that's 17 years against deregulations' 25...". Mistake made by many - that's like comparing apples and oranges (as they say). How about "Regulation lasted from 1930 until 1986 - that's 56 years against deregulation's 25 so far..." - ownership of the industry is surely a completely different matter.
When i look at the Big Five bus companies running the country i cant help but wonder was it worth it and then i look agin and realise that it wasn't
At least in the days of NBC there were still reasonable levels of rural and inter-urban services even if they were "paid" for by the "evil" of cross subsidy.
There was also some semblance of both a local bus company and a national network with rover tickets, standard products, timetable books and maps and travel offices. You'll search in vain to find of that lot offered these days. I don't consider the internet to be an adequate replacement for good old fashioned face to face customer service. My first paid job was in a PTE travel office providing travel info, selling timetables, maps and coach tickets so I have been on the sharp end and know how much that personal service was appreciated.
Interesting to note from a trip last week to the Netherlands that every bus terminal (beside the railway station, of course) had a staffed enquiry office for ticket sales and information. Every one had passengers in them - that says something to me about the value of that service.
plcd1 said...
'At least in the days of NBC there were still reasonable levels of rural and inter-urban services even if they were "paid" for by the "evil" of cross subsidy.'
In many areas the rural and interurban services were in decline throughout the NBC era. I've cited on previous occasions the Red & White service from Ross-on-Wye to Abergavenny, which disappeared completely between 1965 and 1972; and I can recall travelling on the Hants & Dorset service 39 between Southampton and Fordingbridge on its last day of operation, in the early 1970s. In many respects, the rot had already set in (to some extent even before NBC came into being), and NBC didn't manage to stop it.
I would agree with you that the internet is not entirely adequate as a replacement for customer service or timetable books, but I think that is a separate issue that would have developed regardless of the ownership of the operators. Unfortunately, the availability of timetable books was not always as good as it might (or should) have been in the NBC era - and the internet does also have some positive advantages in that respect, but that is definitely a different topic.
A summer job with Cheltenham District came as the NBC corporate livery was just being introduced. There were still many hangovers from the past, such as the unique cream and maroon livery with civic coat of arms and conductors that were still using Red & White leather cash bags despite having been part of the Bristol empire since 1951. Locals felt we were still a very local company.
So, when a passenger boarded a poppy red FLF, fresh from Lawrence Hill works the previous day, and asked what it was like working for a nationalised company now it demonstrated how it was seen from the outside.
As a youngster growing up in the 1970s, it did seem permanent. The PTEs did many good things and seemed a step forward, NBC less so as so many big holes appeared in its network - it was alot less National in coverage by 1980. But one did wonder who would provide decent services in areas such as Lincolnshire or West Dorset if NBC wasn't around. It's a tribute to local operators - and perhaps County Council transport officers - that they did in fact survive.
Some of the Big Five rose very quickly, but maybe it is more surprising that there still are five.
I joined Hants & Dorset as a trainee schedules clerk at Southampton in 1973 (from Maidstone & District).
There were horrendous driver shortages at all the depots we covered. It was reputed that a cleaner at the Fords factory at Eastleigh could earn more for a straight 40 hour week than our road staff did for working 12 hour split shifts for 6 days. No one seemed able to manage it. The Woolston depot had been closed to centralise resources at Southampton which I think then had a run out of over 100, or rather should have. There was an arrangement that staff starting a duty before the one they were scheduled for received a 3 hour additional payment. So the early drivers failed and the later ones jumped in. Those buses due to be the last out of the depot.......
The ex King Alfred operation was I think all, or virtually all, maximum length shifts with all evening and Sunday work withdrawn.
Every management trainee was given the job of replanning the Eastleigh network to try and make (impossible) savings in the number of duty's.
I used to regularly travel on the 1000 departure on the 39 on a Sunday morning to Fordingbridge. Although it regularly left with over 20 passengers the Sunday operation was withdrawn to save a duty......
As for the engineering side.....
I left after a year to join Leicester City Transport.
In the meantime, I have read the article 'The ultimate bus test' in the October issue of 'Buses' which certainly puts a different perspective on the issue of rural and interurban services. If that selection of routes is representative, then the services have survived the 25 years of deregulation surprisingly well - and some are even better than they were in 1986.
Robert, your recollections are fascinating - I was still at school in Southampton at that time, and as an observer, didn't always realise how chaotic it was. 6 years later, I worked there briefly as a conductor, and there were still serious staff shortages and cancellations. Perhaps it had improved in the meantime, and deteriorated again? The cancellations sometimes meant that two or three successive journeys were cancelled on the Waterside routes. If you were the first bus after a couple missing what could you say to the passengers, except to be thankful that we had turned up? They didn't have smart phones or online journey planners to tell them that a journey had been cancelled in those days!
RC169
I also recall being asked to survey a Salisbury departure around 0700 on a few mornings, swopping to get the bus back to Southampton at West Wellow? Going through Millbrook we were approached each morning by angry passengers who wanted to know "where the **** their bus was?" I think the problem was that a number of vehicles were only scheduled to work a few journeys in the peak, and were probably the later run outs (not sure after all this time, but I also recall checking one crew double deck that only did two short school journeys one morning at Eastleigh). The 100+ incidentally included vehicles scattered around the outstations at Hythe, Lyndhurst, Nomansland, Fritham, Romsey, Bishops Waltham and Petersfield. Our office scheduled the Southampton, Eastleigh, Winchester and ex King Alfred rota's and nominally the one at Fareham.
There was also a shortage of roadworthy buses (possibly because of the King Alfred situation), which saw a number of elderly vehicles resurrected (that could just about chug up the hills) and assorted loans (Royal Blue MW coach for instance). It was said that these problems were exacerbated because the company's engineers had also left to join the Ford factory. There was a tale that a group of apprentices at Shirley works had been given the job of rebuilding an engine. It started when it left the works but they had the timing the wrong way and it had to be dragged back from the depot it was taken to!
This was a time of low unemployment and the problems seemed to stem from being unable to compete against the wages because of the national pay agreement.
That was my understanding as I remember it.
By comparison at Leicester traffic office staff were required to get a PSV licence and help out at busy times!
Robert, you're probably right about West Wellow - it's roughly the half-way point on the route to Salisbury.
Another problem that no doubt affected H&D in Southampton was the higher wage levels offered by the municipal operator. The legacy of H&D's vehicle purchasing policy in the early 1960s also had a bearing - during those years, they had purchased very little other than Lodekkas and coaches, so that by 1970 the introduction of more one-person-operation was hindered by a lack of suitable vehicles. NBC did of course try to help - with Leyland Panthers from Maidstone & District, but then perhaps one should have asked why M&D could let so many modern buses go, and preferred to keep older vehicles for themselves. The answer soon manifested itself!
The setup seemed to be unable to react to these problems (some of which were external to the bus operator) in a suitable, or consistent way.
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