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Aviation History
1946
1946 - 1275.PDF
andAIRCRAFT ENGINEER Editorial Director G. GEOFFREY SMITH. M.B.E. Editor - -CM. POULSEN Assistant Editor - MAURICE A. SMITH. D.F.C, (WING CDR., R.A.F.V.R.) At Editor - - JOHN YOXALL FIRST AERONAUTICAL WEEKLY IN THE W6RLD •• FOUNDED 1909 Editorial, Advertising and Publishing Offices: E)ORSET HOUSE, STAMFORD STREET, LONDON, S.E.I Telegram! : Flight pres, Sedist, London. Telephone: Waterloo 3333 (50 line*.) COVENTRY: 8-10, CORPORATION ST. Telegrams : Autocar, Coventry, Telephone: Coventry 5210. BIRMINGHAM, 2: MANCHESTER, 3 : KING EDWARD HOUSE, 260 DEANSGATE.NEW STREcl. _ ,.„ Telegrams: Autopress, Birmingham. Telegrams: Iliffe, Manchester. Telephone: Midland 7191 (7 lines). Telephone: Blackfriars 4412. GLASGOW, C.2 : 26B, RENFIELD ST. Telegrams: Iliffe, Glasgow. Telephone: Central 4857. SUBSCRIPTION RATES : Home and Abroad : Year, £3 I 0. i roonthj, t\ 10 6. Registered at the G.P.O. as a Newspaper No. 1958. Vol. L. July 4th; 1946 Thursdays, One Shilling. Outlook ".. .and Tails You Lose" ANYONE who had any h*ope that, during the passageof the Civil Aviation Bill through its committeeL stages, the position of the charter companies might be cleared up once and for all, must have been gravely disappointed. From time to time, in considering various clauses of the Bill, charter operations have been under discussion, and during the ninth day's proceedings, on June 20th, the subject was freely aired for nearly two and a half hours. Strenuous efforts were made by" Opposition members to obtain from the Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Civil Aviation some clear and infallible defi- nition of what constituted charter work, but it was all of avail. The only thing that has emerged from Mr.no t Ivor Thomas's bantering and sometimes trite replies seems to be the fact that, until such time as the Govern- ment has seen its three corporations functioning and has been able to determine which way the charter cat will jump, it has no intention of making the charter opera- tor's position clear "beyond all reasonable doubt." The result of the efforts at clarification is not a very happy one. The charter operator is faced with a number of explanations of his position, many of them couched vi contradictory terms, and his only consolation at this stage is the assurance of Mr.. Ivor Thomas that that which the law does not forbid is permitted, and that, in fact, the Bill leaves a wide field open to private operators. It is, however, very difficult to reconcile this statement with' another one made by the self-same Parliamentary Secretary, almost within the ambit of a breath, to the effect that he did not want to encourage anybody who was able to obtain an aircraft to enter into the charter field in the hope of making a great success of it. When one bears in mind the heavy maximum penal- ties—a fine of £5,000, or two years' imprisonment— which can be exacted under this Bill for those who ven- ture to start a service which can be described as "sys- tematic," in violation of the monopoly held by the cor- porations, one feels that the eventual outlook for the charter operator is not very bright, and one is strongly tempted to agree with the remark of one Opposition member that the Government does not, in fact, intend to allow any reasonably profitable amount of business to be undertaken by anybody but themselves. But, as we inferred in a complementary leader last week— "Heads I win . . .," it seems we must accept the fact that, since nationalization is nationalization, the State must win either way. Prices and Passports ANY belief that the cost of long-distance air travel f\. is excessive has been effectively countered by no less a person than the chairman of Cunard White Star. At the company's general meeting last week, he said that, when the Queen Elizabeth starts her trans- Atlantic crossings again in the autumn, the lowest mini- mum rate for the top class fare will be of the order of £90, or perhaps even more. If this is, in fact, to be the figure, then there is a very good chance that irrespec- tive of the speed factor, it will be considerably cheaper to cross the Atlantic by air than, first-class, by sea, for the present single air fare of £93, as we mentioned last week, may well, if the recommendations of the North Atlantic Traffic Conference are accepted, be reduced to about £80. This likely financial superiority of air travel, how- ever, will not be assisted in the slightest by the useless nature of some of the red tape with which both the air-line operator and the passenger has to contend before the latter is allowed to leave this country for a foreign destination. We have constantly re- ferred to the vital necessity of reducing to a minimum the complicated machinery of security, customs, immi- gration and the like. It was pleasing, therefore, to note that, last week, not only was a question asked once again in the House of Commons about the steps
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