Hauliers attack levy plan
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• The Road Haulage Association has asked Mrs. Barbara Castle to withhold approval of the recent levy proposal of the Road Transport Industry Training Board. In a letter to Mrs. Castle the director-general of the RHA, Mr. G. K. Newman, expresses the Association's "bitter disappointment" at the failure to include -differential" levies to be applied in different sectors of the road transport industry.
Mr. Newman's letter is also critical of the proposal to limit in general the training grant to 150 per cent of the levy paid. It is considered that there are anomalies in the three-tier levy proposal and the RHA is giving this further consideration.
The desirability of careful consideration of a differential levy was accepted by Mr. Ray Gunter, at that time Minister of Labour, in September 1967, and was reiterated in a further letter to the R HA from the Department of Employment and Productivity in November 1968.
The RHA contends that, in spite of this, the latest levy proposal by the Training Board makes no attempt to distinguish between the various types of employment. The threetier levy which is proposed is bused solely on the size of the individual undertaking and rises to 2.2 per cent for firms with an annual payroll of over £15,000, That a protest against the levy was being made to Mrs. Castle was mentioned last Friday evening by RHA chairman Mr. Noel Wynn when he spoke at the Association's Western Area annual dinner and dance, held at the Grand Hotel, Bristol. Mr. Wynn was replying to Mr. A. N. lrens, chairman of the South West Region Economic Planning Council, who had proposed the toast to the RHA. Area chairman Mr, H. A. Russett welcomed the guests.