mat book. Its subject, the first Atlantic liners, is of special importance, for the development of liner trades utilising steam is one of the crucial benchmarks in the technological and operational revolutions which shipping underwent in the nineteenth century. The volume's coauthors embody the ideal combination of practical and academic expertise although such categorisation does both injustice and this mix is reflected in the subtitle. While embracing some aspects of the economics and business of early steam liner operation on North Atlantic routes, the emphasis is almost entirely on the practical features of engaging with a new technology. 'Seamanship', both as a concept and as a skill, has changed over time, most dramatically in the past two centuries. In the years after 1820 seafarers whose experience was rooted in sail had to come to terms with new practices, and while steam brought the inestimable advantage of a measure of independence from wind and tide, the handling of powered vessels required the modification of existing, and the acquisition of new, skills and techniques. It is this learning process of adaptation and adjustment, a difficult one, oft fraught with casualty, which is the focus of study. Chapters 3-9 (of a total of eleven chapters), with the titles of 'Hull shape and stability', 'The engines and boilers', 'Paddle wheels', 'Masting, rigging and sails', 'Handling sail and steam' and 'Handling under power', reveal the unusual character of the work. Given this emphasis, one is tempted to enquire why the study confined itself to Atlantic liners, as opposed to early steam generally, and the virtual omission of the Mediterranean one of the first major trade routes where steam or sail assist achieved significant early penetration springs to mind. However, this stress on the practical aspect of the coming of steam is to be commended, for it has been much neglected in the past, not merely in the context of shipping. Far too often historians reviewing the significance of technological advance note in passing that it required some adjustment by labour. That adjustment, as this study reveals, should not be relegated to an afterthought. Labour had a vital role to play in the shift towards more capital-intensive operation, and this examination of the process of acquiring new skills deserves consideration, and may serve as an exemplar, beyond the steam shipping sector. In its unusual and important focus, its quite exceptional illustrations and its use of previously unstudied original log books (although the omission of important official government inquiries from its primary sources is surprising), this book is to be welcomed and, one hopes, will be widely read.

Economic AffairsVolume 16, Issue 5 p. 42-44 Ten Years of Progress on the Buses John Hibbs, John Hibbs Emeritus Professor of Transport Management, University of Central Engalnd in Birmingham.Search for more papers by this author John Hibbs, John Hibbs Emeritus Professor of Transport Management, University of Central Engalnd in Birmingham.Search for more papers by this author First published: December 1996 https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1468-0270.1996.tb00568.xAboutPDF ToolsRequest permissionExport citationAdd to favoritesTrack citation ShareShare Give accessShare full text accessShare full-text accessPlease review our Terms and Conditions of Use and check box below to share full-text version of article.I have read and accept the Wiley Online Library Terms and Conditions of UseShareable LinkUse the link below to share a full-text version of this article with your friends and colleagues. Learn more.Copy URL Share a linkShare onFacebookTwitterLinkedInRedditWechat Volume16, Issue5December 1996Pages 42-44 RelatedInformation

Each of these publications, while intended primarily for the enthusiast, is a mine of information for the historian. In their detailed reporting of considerable developments, there are times when the reader must wonder 'why', but it is the detachment that gives confidence to the reliability of the data in each case. Thus Hunter's book records the 'Scottishness' of the company's operations, such as the practice that lasted so long of using paper labels stuck to the windscreen as destination indicators. He also records, in passing, the pre-1931 need for drivers and conductors to wear the badges of several local authorities, responsible for licensing services; one had heard of this for vehicles, but not before this for staff. The company is treated as a single unit, with only passing mention of its associates and subsidiaries in the Scottish combine of the 1930s onwards. Mr Hunter would do historians great service by writing up the other companies in the group in the same way. Perhaps it says something for Scottish standards, but while Mr Hunter's book has a useful index, Mr Jenkinson's, like most enthusiast works, has none. That apart, his study of one of the more individual of the British combine companies is equally valuable. West Yorkshire had an early start, and developed into a typical mixed provincial business, with urban industrial territory, thin rural areas, and local town services in seaside and market towns. But the special value of this study arises from what may be called the political aspects of its story the joint undertakings (more common abroad than in the UK) with 97

What are the prospects for railway privatisation? John Hibbs, of Birmingham University, outlines some of the problems for what could be the last major privatisation before health and education.

A recent publication from the National Center for Policy Analysis in Dallas confirms the superiority of the supply of transport through prices in the market over provision by state allocation John Hibbs, Director of the School of Transport Studies at the City of Birmingham Polytechnic, extends the analysis to transport in Britain, and warns of obstruction by vested interests.

Based upon a doctoral research programme which surveyed bus and coach licensing systems throughout the world, this article seeks to arrive at a taxonomy of licensing. It identifies the familiar principles of quality, quantity and price control, examines them against the British licensing system introduced in 1930, and concludes that quantity control forms a more or less permeable barrier to contestability in the market for public road passenger transport; where it is strong, it is a constraint upon the sustainability of the market. It defines the British and the many similar licensing systems as arbitrational, and contrasts this characteristic with systems which are overtly based upon the allocation of a franchise. The central section of the paper analyses various systems in more detail, and warns against too great a dependence upon the letter of the law. Much depends upon the ways in which regulations can be interpreted, and cases exist where practice contradicts the statute. There is found to be a division between arbitrational and franchise systems that is broadly the same as the division between countries with a Common Law background, and those with a Romano‐Germanic polity. Franchise is however common in the control of urban transport in countries where the extra‐urban system is arbitrational. Franchise systems are further defined as being either concessions, or subcontracts. The significance of the franchising authority is examined. The final section sets out the issues of principle that appear to follow from this analysis, and stresses the importance of the distinction between arbitration and franchise for the understanding of licensing and control.

Nevertheless the market for such books is limited, and they must to a greater or less extent lean towards either the enthusiast or the professional market, while seeking to satisfy both. Anderson and Frankis have tried to achieve a balance of this kind, but it cannot be said that they have achieved it. The professional reader will sense that they endorse the 'establishment' interpretation of bus history, while at the same time the data contained in the series of appendices are not going to satisfy the enthusiast they do not always make consistent use of the standard notation for body configuration. Some of the material in the appendices is of doubtful value even to the enthusiast. The month and year when flashers replaced semaphore direction indicators on thirty-six coaches is a case in point. On the other hand, the allocation of vehicles to depots from the summer of 1969 would have been of greater value if it had been part of a series at say ten-year intervals. The narrative is much more thorough in this way, recording a story that is too little known beyond the devotees of the bus industry. Yet at times one yearns for more hard data: it is important to know that in 1954 Cornwall had for the first time a daily, all-the-year express road service, but to what extent was it patronised? There is a great quantity of microinformation, yet the impact of the 1955 railway strike and the 1957 provincial bus strike is passed over in a paragraph of five lines. The illustrations are well chosen, and few of them are 'posed'. My favourite is the preserved Royal Blue coach photographed in the Porte d'Orleans, Paris, in 1967. If readers missed the first edition of this book, they should buy this one now, and libraries should buy it in any event. John Hibbs City of Birmingham Polytechnic The}ournal ofTransport H istory

The Government was widely applauded by advocates of the free market for the enactment of the Transport Acts of 1980 and 1985, But the apparent success in deregulation still hides potentiol disfortians of the market. Dr John Hibbs, Director of the institute of Transport Studies at Birmingham Polytechnic, exmimnes the residual scope for state interference.

The fares increase in London Transport following Ken Livingstone's illegal rates surcharge reinforces the argument that public transport be removed beyond the reach of vote‐buying politicians. Deregulation of coaches indicates that the market can provide a cheap and efficient alternative if town halls stop raising bureaucratic obstacles and subsidising municipal competition.