(2) Government management would primarily regard the interests of the community and of the country as a whole, and the substitution of that condition for the existing system under which the interests of private trading concerns take first place in the thoughts and efforts of those responsible for management would have the effect of securing a more equal and more satisfactory development of the resources of the country, and, as one writer expresses it with more than the usual proportion of assumption in his statement, trade would be stimulated under equitable, reasonable, and uniform systems of rates. (3) The change would result in the removal of most of the serious complaints made against the existing administration of railways. (4) Those who refuse to look upon the matter as mainly a commercial problem think and hope that new means would be found for the satisfaction of the social needs of the nation if the railways were at the disposal of the Government. (5) Experience of the economy resulting from large combinations in other industries is invoked in support of the proposal to get rid of the separate administrations of private railways. It is said that the advantage of production on the largest scale by a single corporation in place of production by a number of smaller units is being verified by the experience of nearly every important trade and industry. The principle has been recognized in the history of railway development in this country by the amalgamation of large numbers of small railways into the great railway systems which we now see, and it is argued that a further step should now be taken in the same direction. But a step involving the creation of so great a monopoly as further large amalgamations would involve can only, it is thought, be taken by the State. In this country the largest railway system under one management is no greater than about 2,000 miles in length, whereas in the United States of America railway systems covering about 15,000 miles are now under the control of a single President and a Board of Directors. It is said, therefore, that modern methods of administration have made it feasible to direct the 23,000 miles of railway in the United Kingdom efficiently and successfully by means of one comprehensive organization, and probably if there is to be one organization there would be no difference of opinion that the single organization to own, control, and manage the railways must be the State. Most of the principal objections are, I think, covered by the following list:-- (1) State management would be less efficient than management under private enterprise. (2) The extension of Government patronage, by placing at the disposal of Government such a vast number of appointments to lucrative offices. (3) The risk of political corruption, not only in connection with the exercise of patronage, but also in ordinary administration in the settlement of questions relating to charges, wages, and services.