British Public Corporations: Some Recent Developments

Abstract

T HE PURPOSE OF THIS ARTICLE is to review some of the changes that have taken place in the structure and control of the British nationalized industries since 1951, when a Conservative Government was returned to power, and also to comment on two new public corporations which it set up. The Conservatives, under Churchill, denationalized iron and steel, and road haulage; they made some changes in British Railways; they set up an Atomic Energy Authority to take over responsibilities for the peaceful development of atomic energy; and they created an Independent Television Authority to control a new private industry: the commercial television broadcasting industry. The denationalization of road haulage and iron and steel involved the abolition of two public corporations (the Road Haulage Executive, and the Iron and Steel Corporation of Great Britain), and the creation of three new ones (the Iron and Steel Board, the Iron and Steel Holding and Realization Agency and the Road Haulage Disposals Board), the last two being temporary. Some changes were also made in the structure of the electricity industry in Scotland. A number of committees were set up to enquire into the structure and working of the nationalized industries. The most important of these were the Fleck Committee (which dealt with the organization of the coal industry) and the Herbert Committee (which investigated nationalized electricity). Finally, there was a full-dress inquiry by a Select Committee of the House of Commons into the problem of Parliamentary accountability, which resulted in the setting up of a Parliamentary Select Committee on Nationalized Industries.