50 Years Ago: Beeching’s Cuts (2012)

The 50 Years Ago column from the August 2012 issue of the Socialist Standard

The axe man cometh.

This year’s report from the British Transport Commission indicated where the proposed cuts in rail services are likely to fall.

The Newport to Brecon line, for instance, in South Wales. Here, said Transport Minister Marples, a statistical half-man is being carried for one hundred and seven miles by a 160 ton train — about equal to a five-ton crane lifting a bottle of beer.

“It would pay us,” he said, “to give that man a car and close the line.”

That is the yardstick which the Beeching inquiry has had to use. Not: Is it useful? but: Does it pay? Some of the Commission’s undertakings can answer yes to this question. London Transport pays. British Road Services and the docks have increased their receipts.

Only the railways — and only some parts of them at that — fail utterly to conform to capitalism’s law of existence: Does it pay?

Mr. Marples is not alone in his recognition of this law. Labour Party spokesman George Strauss said, when the House of Commons were debating the Transport Commission’s report, that the railway losses gave people the impression that what he called “publicly owned” transport was a failure.

Mr. Strauss has his definition of a failure, and of a success. The report showed, he said, that the reverse was true because all the services except the railways and the inland waterways had made a profit.

Both Tories and Labour are united in the opinion that to succeed nationalised industry must make a profit. Which means they agree that basically nationalised industries are as much a part of capitalism’s economy as any private industry is.

One fact seems to have escaped notice. Removing the rail services from many parts of the country means that those areas are being left to depend upon road transport. This means that the government are virtually creating transport monopolies all over the country.

This is hardly consistent with the Conservative doctrine of what they like to call “healthy” competition. But really capitalism is impatient of all doctrine — except one.

Does it pay?

(from The News in Review”, Socialist Standard, August 1962)

50 Years Ago: Beeching’s Rail Cuts (2013)

The 50 Years Ago column from the May 2013 issue of the Socialist Standard

Doctor Beeching’s casualty list was as long as anyone could have expected.

Nearly a third of the passenger route-miles to be withdrawn; almost a half of the stations to be shut down; seventy thousand railwaymen, by one means or another, to be got rid of.

The Tories have always claimed that they are the party of free competition, which is supposed to be something which will bring enormous benefits to us all. According to Conservative propagandists, the worst thing that can happen to us is to be left at the mercy of a monopoly, which will do dreadful things to our standards of living. Yet the Beeching Plan will give, over large areas of the country, a transport monopoly to the road interests. What if these interests act as the Tories have assured us monopolies always act?

This is not the only example of how flexible is the Tories’ regard for their own consistency. At one time the British capitalist class, with the support of the Labour and Conservative Parties, thought that nationalisation of certain industries was in their own overall interests and was, therefore, inevitable, desirable and morally sound.

But since 1945 the capitalist class have been taking a second look at State control. Slowly but definitely they have changed the internal structure of some of the State industries; nowhere is this so apparent as on the railways.

Which brings us to the question of whether nationalisation, apart from being a fraud upon the working class, has also disappointed the capitalists?

The Beeching Plan seems to be going out for an immediate profit from the railways, without providing the kind of facilities which the capitalist class as a whole must require from a railway system. That was exactly what nationalisation was supposed to avoid.

There will probably be a big row over the Beeching report, with both sides representing their case as the one which has everyone’s interests at heart. And inevitably the working class will be wasting their time in another fruitless controversy while the real problem—the private ownership of society’s means of life—is left to do its worst.

(From ‘The News in Review’, Socialist Standard, May 1963)

News in Review: Beeching’s rail cuts (1963)

The News in Review column from the May 1963 issue of the Socialist Standard

Beeching’s rail cuts

Doctor Beeching’s casuality list was as long as anyone could have expected.

Nearly a third of the passenger route-miles to be withdrawn; almost a half of the stations to be shut down; seventy thousand railwaymen, by one means or another, to be got rid of.

The Tories have always claimed that they are the party of free competition, which is supposed to be something which will bring enormous benefits to us all. According to Conservative propagandists, the worst thing that can happen to us is to be left at the mercy of a monopoly, which will do dreadful things to our standards of living. Yet the Beeching Plan will give, over large areas of the country, a transport monopoly to the road interests. What if these interests act as the Tories have assured us monopolies always act?

This is not the only example of how flexible is the Tories’ regard for their own consistency. At one time the British capitalist class, with the support of the Labour and Conservative Parties, thought that nationalisation of certain industries was in their own overall interests and was, therefore, inevitable, desirable and morally sound.

But since 1945 the capitalist class have been taking a second look at State control. Slowly but definitely they have changed the internal structure of some of the State industries; nowhere is this so apparent as on the railways.

Which brings us to the question of whether nationalisation, apart from being a fraud upon the working class, has also disappointed the capitalists?

The Beeching Plan seems to be going out for an immediate profit from the railways, without providing the kind of facilities which the capitalist class as a whole must require from a railway system. That was exactly what nationalisation was supposed to avoid.

There will probably be a big row over the Beeching report, with both sides representing their case as the one which has everyones’ interests at heart. And inevitably the working class will be wasting their time in another fruitless controversy while the real problem—the private ownership of society’s means of life—is left to do its worst.

Minister’s morals

Macmillan's government, perhaps on its death bed, continues to provide the popular press with some juicy front page copy.

The Vassall case, as far as the TWTWTW set is concerned, is still going strong. Jokes about the Admiralty are still sound social currency.

The case of the junior minister who lent his car to a delinquent youth was deprived of its news value just in time by the minister’s quick resignation.

And on top of all this, the missing model—missing, at any rate, until the press ran her to ground in Spain. (The Guardian reported her discovery with a sober couple of inches; The Daily Express with a giant, predictably leggy picture of her.)

The ministers' denials that they were engaged in what are coyly known as “improper" relationships in any of these cases, are convincing enough. Yet however subtly it has been done, mud has been thrown; the kind of mud that sticks.

A capitalist government can do all manner of unpleasant things to the working class who put it in power. It can break strikes. It can try to hold down wages. It can take the working class into a war which they know a lot of them will not survive. The working class do not seem to object to this kind of treatment sufficiently to turn the government out.

But a government cannot for long get away with anything which smells of corruption or sexual licence. Perhaps the working class, whose teeth are cut on capitalism's morals, feel that their leaders should themselves be beyond reproach. And perhaps there is an element of envy, at the easy, glamorous lives of rich men and powerful politicians,, contrasted to the drab existence of most workers.

In fact, the personal morals of members of a government are quite unimportant. There is no evidence that impeccable family men administer capitalism any more humanely than those whose private life is rather more complicated.

While workers click their tongues over the front page stories, capitalist society—the real scandal—quietly continues.

The budget

The theme of this year's Budget, claimed the Chancellor of the Exchequer, was expansion. Cheers, it seemed, all round. They are all Keynesians now and therefore believe that reducing taxes and increasing government spending will actually stimulate an industrial revival.

If this were so, then capitalism would have solved one of its big problems. There would never be any more recessions; no industry need ever collapse again.

But facts say, quite plainly, that economic setbacks are as much a part of capitalism as ever. In fact, the Chancellor's financial juggling, far from preceding and guiding economic trends, is the result of those trends and trails some way after them. Maudling's tax cuts, for example, were widely forecast to happen in some shape or form, because the economic and political situation indicated that the time was ripe for them.

In any case there is nothing new about “expansion" Budgets. Butler introduced one in 1953. So did Amory in 1959. A short time after these Budgets, both Chancellors forgot that they had been telling us that the way to prosperity was to expand by cutting taxes and increasing spending. The government brought in other measures which increased taxes and reduced spending. There is no reason to assume that Maudling's optimism will not be similarly forgotten.

This is the economic switchback of capitalism, which Budgets and the other measures try to control.

They never succeed; the problems of capitalism live on, long after the Chancellors who try to solve them are forgotten As each Budget Day draws near, the Chancellor is swamped with advice from all manner of reformist organisations. Some of these have recently come to the conclusion that the financial affairs of British capitalism are exceptionally complicated and need an enormous administrative effort to keep them going.

In The Guardian on April 2nd, Christopher Layton was hoping:

  Will tomorrow’s Budget be a milk and water affair, or will it at last demonstrate that the Government is seeking, to get to the roots of the country’s economic sickness?

And his question was partly answered by Samuel Brittan in The Observer on April 7th:

   . . . Mr. Maudling will need luck as well as skill if the gamble is to come off.

and

  Unfortunately the international financial system is full of weaknesses; the U.S. economy lost its zip several years ago and the European boom looks very old and tired. It is on these world uncertainties that we must keep our fingers crossed.  . . . 

Budgets, just like the rest of capitalism’s efforts to control its own anarchies, are a gamble. Maudling’s may be designed to allow Britain's ruling class to breathe more freely, but it is just as likely to fail in this as its predecessors.

Typhoid in Zermatt

One by one, some ugly facts have trickled out about the typhoid outbreak in Zermatt.

At first it may have seemed like a simple case of bad luck, the sort that could happen anywhere, any time.

Then an article in the Swiss paper Gazette de Lausanne suggested that the first case of the disease was diagnosed last September, that the village’s water supply had a doubtful origin and was not properly cleansed. A couple of letters in The Guardian of April 1st, written by people who had recently returned from Zermatt, offered additional evidence that all has not been well in the Swiss resort for several months. The lid was really blown off by a merciless TV programme. Later in the year, we shall probably know the full facts and it will not be a pleasant story.

In the height of the holiday season the population of Zermatt usually rose from its permanent 2,000 to about 15,000. Its prices were high, its hoteliers thriving. To keep up its attraction for winter sports enthusiasts, Zermatt installed a lot of machinery to take the visitors up to the top of the snow slopes. But behind this facade, it seems, the resort was neglecting essentials like a pure water supply.

Its own water resources were not sufficient to cater for the . influx of holidaymakers and so Zermatt has been tapping other, more risky, sources. Some of these were damaged by severe frost and that, possibly, is where the disease started.

In other words, Zermatt preferred to concentrate upon the gimmicks which it knew would bring in a quick profit and to take a chance on the safety of its public health facilities. Capitalism in general has come to realise that this is a short-sighted policy which can lead to serious loss of profits in the long run.

This is how it has worked for Zermatt, The typhoid outbreak has ruined the image of Switzerland as a hygienic country of sun and snow and healthy holidays.

And it has brought the unfortunate typhoid sufferers face to face with a principle which capitalism, in one way or another, always applies; profit first, the rest a long way after.

Nicky

- Who's Nicky ?

- You mean what's Nicky. It’s the National Incomes Commission.

- Who commissioned it?

- It was set up by the government.

- What for?

- To consider wage settlements which the government thinks are too generous to the workers.

- Has it got a chairman?

- Yes.

- Paid?

- Yes.

- How much?

- Er — £12,500 a year.

- But . . .

- No more questions, please.

The Wages of Wisdom (1965)

From the January 1965 issue of the Socialist Standard

Many working-class folk, scratching along as best they can on their meagre wages, cast envious eyes on the minority whose income is well above the average. Generally this high income is derived from rent, profit and interest, these things being in themselves a sign of property ownership. However, modern capitalism pays some people large salaries for performing functions that the capitalist class, or sections of them, often through the State apparatus, regard as useful.

When ordinary wage earners grumble about this, sure enough out come the same old arguments from their political and economic masters. To get first-class brains we must pay first-class money, they say. Thereupon the masses, taking another long steady look at their odd assortment of small change, think that they must indeed be dull fellows. Because they believe in and support property ownership, class society, and the wages system, there is no other attitude they can adopt; their only outlet for dissatisfaction is grumbling envy of each other.

The last Conservative Government, wanting to make the railways pay, acquired the aid of Dr. Beeching. We shall place the railways under the control of this businessman, they said, and because he is so clever, we shall pay him £24,000 a year. Incidentally, the Conservative Government went on controlling not only the railways, but Dr. Beeching as well. Should one be naive—and, surprisingly many are in these matters—one would reason that a person earning £24,000 p.a. must be the Great Khan of business acumen—no task, even one as formidable as that of making British Railways solvent, could withstand such an intellectual demon.

However, the problems of capitalism are not all that easy to tackle. A social system based on buying and selling the things of life, where the very ownership of these things leads to conflict, is hardly conducive to firm control Some items of recent news show that even the astute Dr. Beeching does not shine through very well.

The Sun reports that Dr. Beeching’s run-down of services, in which some 3,600 covered trucks and an unknown number of open wagons have been condemned, was overdone. Now some Goods Depots have only one-third of the trucks they need. Trucks in Norfolk sold to scrap dealers are being hired back for the sugar beet harvest.

At the same time Mr. E. S. Fay, the Railway Board’s Counsel, forecast a £250 million deficit by the end of the year.

(He was applying to the Transport Tribunal for permission to increase season ticket charges.) He explained that the Railways Board had been guaranteed £450 million to meet any deficit over the first five years, but in two-fifths of the time, five-ninths of the money had been used.

Capitalism cannot be made into a neat, workable, smooth running operation. No doubt when estimates are made on such things as streamlining railways and making them solvent, the plans look waterproof enough. But what if prices and wages rise, avenues of future exploitation contract or expand? In no time at all, the plans are shot full of holes like a fish net.

Perhaps those who for ever argue that capitalism is worth retaining will laugh away the nonsense of paying one man £24,000 p.a. without affecting the bankruptcy of a rail system while the train drivers and signalmen’s yearly wages are measured in hundreds.

To grumble, whine, protest and strike is of no great use if you are at the same time defending and maintaining capitalism. To defend the system is to deserve what it throws at you. 

Jack Law

News From Wales (1963)

From the June 1963 issue of the Socialist Standard

Coinciding with the plans to close down railways in Wales comes the plan for the dispersal of the civil population in the event of a nuclear attack. The chief — and practically the only area of dense population in Wales — is the county of Glamorgan and a part of Monmouthshire, so the “plan”—if it can be so called—is presumably mainly concerned with the towns of Newport and Swansea and the City of Cardiff, together with the immediate surroundings. Swansea was named in Hansard as one of the 19 areas in England and Wales from which a part of the population might be dispersed.

The Civil Defence Authority, it is stated, would set in motion the scheme for assembling the threatened population in Swansea (it is not stated whether before, during or after the 10 minute warning), though one may suppose it will be during the 10 minutes period of grace. The tragic farce is that no one knows where or when the town’s population would be removed to safety (Western Mail, 9/4/63). “Details for dispersal plans do not exist,” states Mr. Thomas, Assistant Chief Defence Officer, “But I am sure that someone will get on the ’phone and tell us what to do"

These gentlemen are going to be extremely busy during the 10 minute interval — so busy indeed that they can only ensure that “ . . . 43 per cent, of the population would be dispersed . . .  to what are considered to be less likely areas.” We note with “gratitude” the facts that 57 per cent. of the townspeople are likely to be left behind, also that those who are taken out have no guarantee that they will be safe in their new location. The Western Mail points out that “It is widely recognized that the ‘fourth danger—’ fall-out—may even affect reception areas.”

To come back to where we started the “plan” states that the transport for dispersal would be mainly by train but that “other planner,” Dr. Beeching, has so arranged it that the main artery, the Central Wales line, will be non-existent!

The whole sorry business, then, amounts to this—that 70,000 people of Swansea are to be alerted in 10 minutes, are to be transported on a non-existent railway line to an area which is quite likely to be contaminated by the “fourth” hazard (fall-out), leaving 57 per cent, of the population behind. This problem is, indeed, full of disastrous overtones. It is probably the reason why Swansea has appointed an educated man, the town’s Director of Education, to see it through!

With this vital news in the air all other news appears flat, but for good measure, and to be fair, one must report that the various political organizations continue to be active on such vital items as demanding the issuing of police summonses, the recording of Council Meeting Minutes and Rate notices in Welsh, not to mention the singing of the Welsh National Anthem in cinemas and Bingo sessions.

Socialists in S. Wales, whilst constantly pointing out the complete chaos and the inability of the “planners” of capitalism (who cannot even “plan” their own demise with any accuracy) are all too often accused of being unrealistic and “idealistic.” A comparison of the present “plan” for evacuation with the Socialist proposition should quickly enable the critics to decide who are really the unrealistic ones.

W. Brain.