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Aviation History
1949
1949 - 0076.PDF
54 FLIGHT JANUARY 13TH, 1949 Aviation Analysis A Personal Expression of Opinion on the Effect of Nationalization of Civil Aviation in Great Britain and a Brief Review of those Events which led to Government Control of the Airlines TO the members of the Metropolitan Section of the Insti-tute of Transport on January 3rd Mr. John Branckergave his views on the nationalization of air transport in this country. They were, he stated, purely personal, and in "no way the considered opinion of B.O.A.C. or any other body. After a general analysis he left his audience to decide whether nationalization had been beneficial or otherwise, emphasizing that there must be some standpoint for such judgment, which could only be the main national interest, not forgetting the interests of the Common- \< wealth and ultimately the world. He sounded a word of warning to avoid attributing to nationaliza- tion results which were due- to entirely different causes, but which happened to have come almost simultaneously. He referred briefly to conditions after the 1914-18 war, when European countries bolstered their own airlines, and this country was forced into granting a subsidy of some kind. Since the Government could not subsidize British com- panies to compete with each other, the British opera- tors were amalgamated and formed into one com- pany, Imperial Airways. At that time, although there were certain obliga- tions as to the aircraft used, and of Government- nominated directors on the Board, there was no question of the Air Ministry having anything to do with the management, nor of the company having anything approaching monopoly rights. Air trans- port had, he said, always had rather a special rela- tion with Governments since at the outset it had been unable, except in very peculiar circumstances, to stand on its own feet, and ' had "it not been a very special enterprise it might easily have been left to expire. The whole conception of aviation was inextricably bound up with the idea of war and defence, but had it been able to show profits immediately, it might have been strong enough to retain its strategic import- ance without losing its independence. Owing to its very nature and its own shortcomings, however, it was bound to receive its fair share of Government interest, although not always its fair share of support. Mr. Brancker then leferred briefly to the period between the wars, when the Licensing Board was set up, the Cadman Enquiry was held, and when there was considerable friction between Imperial Airways and the Department of Civil Avia- tion, then part of the Air Ministry. It was difficult to recon- cile the views of .the Government department and those of a world-wide operator with a private-enterprise* outlook. Cadman Committee The lecturer again referred to the Cadman Committee and its recommendations for splitting the routes between Imperial Airways and British Airways, Ltd., which proved so cumber- some, and which were quickly abandoned in favour of another type of organization. The Committee recommended greater financial support for British air transport, but in its failure to satisfy the principal requirements of the industry, the door was left open to early revision. After Lord Reith, then Sir John Reith, became chairman of Imperial Airways, that com- pany and British Airways, Ltd., were amalgamated by Government Act, and B.O.A.C. was set up as a statutory Corporation. This was the first step in the direction of national ownership. A clause in the Act gave the Secretary of State for Air special powers with regard to the Corpora- tion in a state of emergency, and since war had already started, B.O.A.C. did not actually function according to the intentions of its peacetime charter. The result was that the Government became the owner of an operating concern without giving itself many safeguards; in fact, domestic airlines and charter operators were not restricted. In America, instead of abandoning all civil aircraft design as had been virtually done in this country during the war, the United States continued to pursue energetically the con- struction and development of transport aircraft. Moreover, instead of reducing transport services to a minimum, they Mr.J. W.S.branc- ker who is General Manager, Eastern Division, R.O.A.C. were expanded, and besides encouraging the growth of national operators they were employed to form the nucleus of a Trans- port Command for which generous allocations of staff and_ equipment were made by the American authorities. Mr. Brancker emphasized this point to compare the position in which Britain found herself at the end of the war, with no genuine transport aircraft and only a small number of indi- viduals with civil aviation experience. Then followed a long . period of indecision as to the ultimate shape which 3-CtJSiIL air transport should take. Many months passed while discussions took place, on the principle that i— B.O.A.C. should remain as a wholly owned Govern- '\O ment Corporation while B.E.A. and B.S.A.A. would be set up as organizations jointly owned by the Gov- ernment and private enterprise. When the present Government assumed power, however, those schemes were abandoned, and after further deliberation and delay, the existing system of three nationally owned Corporations was laid down by Act of Parliament. In Mr. Brancker's opinion, it was those delays which set us back so much in the early days, and if private enterprise could have been given the "all clear" from the start, it might have made a very much more rapid get-away. He did not, however, underestimate the difficulties and changed conditions which would have affected private enterprise as much as the national Corporations, In examining some of the problems, Mr. Brancker suggested that although the main users were faced with shortage of suitable aircraft, had they been in- dependent of Government ownership they would have1 found it easier to be critical of Government policy ' in the matter of aircraft types. It was, however, a moot point whether they would have been more successful because even a more accurate description of what was required would not necessarily have produced it. There was always, he said, a tendency for a Government-owned organization, when it found itself in disagreement with its controlling Min- istry, to make its protests and to accept the decision which ! might well be good for national policy but would not essen- tially produce efficient air services. There was no doubt, he said, that the decision to use British types which were not designed ab initio as transport aircraft had been responsible for the greater part of the Corporation's losses. Competition Not Eliminated •""~'"- There was, Mr. Brancker thought, considerable distrust of the word "monopoly," and it.was the fact that the Corpora- tions had certain rights which made many people critical of nationalization. He made the observation, however, that there was considerable competition from foreign operators over the vast majority of sectors flown, which were limited only by inter-Government agreements and I.A.T.A. regulations, and some form of licensing and rationalization had always been found desirable. Nationalization, therefore, could not be charged with the elimination of competition. Although not suggesting that it was necessary for our own airlines to be nationalized, there was no doubt that it had made it easier to arrange close partnerships with Australia and South Africa. In answer to criticisms that nationalization had encouraged the Corporation to organize itself on a lavish base, Mr. Brancker thought that had B.O.A.C. operated for a time in normal peace conditions such a tendency for undue expansion would have rectified itself automatically. As it was, there had been a tendency for the organization to get closer and closer to Civil Service lines and there had been a definite ten- dency on the staffs to accept Civil Service outlook, and individuals had been unwilling to risk taking decisions. Referring to the set-up of the Ministry of Civil Aviation, the lecturer suggested that the number of Committees which had been formed to enquire into almost every aspect of the business was due to the rapid expansion after a period of almost complete hibernation. He did not think that any lack of initiative had
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