LEAVES FROM THE INSPECTOR' S NOTEBOOK.
Page 9
If you've noticed an error in this article please click here to report it so we can fix it.
Roads and Transport Exhibits.
IT IS a very useful and interesting display of certain classes of commercial-motor vehicles at the Agricultural Hall under the auspices of the County Councils Association. The types shown are those that were selected by a joint committee of the S.M.M. and T. and the A.B.M.A.M. It does not seem quite apparent why, it was 'necessary to limit the types that could be shown, unless it was desired to arrive at a definition of " municipal vehicle." The decision arrived at, and which was binding, under the exhibition bond, on the Association organizing the Roads and Transport Show, has resulted in certain anomalies. Great use was made of the permission to show "tip wagons," but these are, by no' means, exclusively municipal wagons. Increasingly large numbers are owned lay private firms and individual hauliers. A majority of the exhibitors produced tippers, therefore, as the means to the end. The committee, however, decided not to allow singledeck or double-deck buses, as they were not " exclusively municipal." And, it vo happened that I was present at Islington when permission to enter was refused, quite correctly according to a late decision of the Committee it appears, for an exceptionally fine single-deck bus belonging to a municipality. And, yet, anyone could show a tip wagon belonging to anyone ! Quaint regulations! Of 'course, the L.G.O.CI. service does not belong to a municipahty but it's the one big exception, and it isn't the L.b.C.'s fault that it does not! Were there any builders of buses on the Committee that ruled them out as not" essentially municipal "7I think there were. If so, I know they will permit me to say I do not think much cf their decision when 1 recall the tip wagon camouflage at Islington.
Allowing the M.-of M. to Die.
Perhaps it does not interest the general public very much to enquire what has become of the Ministry of Munitions, and as to whether 'the much-talked-of Ministry of Supply, and its projected superman Lord Inverforth, will be established. But, to our own industry, only lately emerged from the toils,of control by one or more of the multitudinous branches of the M. of M., and some of us still a'bit entangled in the meshes of its financial netting, it is interesting to speculate as to the fate of what in our early days was called "The Ministry,* when there were to others—they were all Offices or Boards. The plain fact of the matter is that the theory of centralized demand and purchase of all Government 'hulk or quantity supplies, which was to be the keynote of Lord Inverforth'sMinistry of Supply Scheme, is supposed to be in force now, but is very largely honoured in the breach.
Much of the old War Office (Army) Contracts Department has actually been absorbed by the M. of M., and a. well-known lawyer. permanent Civil Servant has come from the Tothill Street establishment to act as " Director of Munitions Requirements and Statistics." " Old Ministries never die, they only fade away." The Government could not abolish the M. of M. so they had the idea of letting it expire as it liked, more or less, but of giving it a new name, so that its tombstone could not 'be easily found. But that scheme has gone astray. The Admiralty in 'particular would not have it. So that there is still a Ministry of Munitions—and there is still an M.T. piece. of it, fortunately under one of the more Mee aginative and very able Civil Servants. It will be many months before that epitaph can be written. The Finance Department has hundreds of thousands of bills on its hands of which it cannot make head or tail, so I am told.
Geddes Forgets the Terminals.
Quite a lot of usare, chuokling with satisfaction— a little prematurely., to my way of thinking—becanse of the large friendly paw that our own particular Tiger (Geddes by name) held out to the industry at the S.M. M. and T. Banquet on Guy Fawkes night, wasn't it? I have read not a little smug satisfaction in the columns of the interested Press because Sir Eric adroitly ladled out the stuff that the banquet wanted to hear. Personally,. I am not going to permit myself a chuckle until.I'learn of the accomplishment of encouragement rather than of' its promise. The Minister'of Taaneport,' it should be noted, is already quite sure that there is'ino economic advantage in long-distance-road, transport, and there, of course, shows one of the Tiger's claws. He Could not imagine, he said, such competition with the railway delivery of goods in Glasgow " next morning." that had been despatched from London at 6 p.m. the night before. Nor can 1, of course, Sir Erie! But, believe me, although you have not the pleasure of my ,acquaintance, I can imagine such competition when I have added three weeks to collect and accept at Euston. or Camden Town, and some part of a week to deliver in Glasgow! Not all goods to Glasgow are Parcels ,post, nor can one send anything by railway nowadays justtwhenlone likes.Inject one of the great advantages that your motor vehicle offers over railway transport is speed in conveyance from door -to door, the value of which often far outweighs any difference in transport charges.
A Snowball for the Industry.
A seasonable title that, as it happens atothe time of writing! I was prompted to its choiee by the spectacle, as I sit in a window overlooking a, considerable hill on a heavily-trafficked route where the heavyteamed wagons are struggling and sweating on the glass-surfaced snow, the while that four-tonners burly up and down 'past them fully laden and relatively " sure-footed " on their rubber tyres.
Surely the fates are planning a very 'marvellous future for this commercial-vehicle industry of ours. • I, for one, would not wish to be identified with any other. Nor can I conceive any comparable prospects for the pleasure or touring side of the trade—there won't be the same moneyin it, in,mytopinion. The fates themselves are working in our favour, consistently, at home and abroad. Only now are we beginning to learn, through our order books, the full and ,wonderful effect of the lesson taught to tens of thousands by the M.T. during the war. Surely there are few cases in existence at home to-day in which it still remains inecessary to explain the inherent ad-. tag tot mechanical haulage over riva.1 systems. We are all just beginning to realize the wonderful nature of this asset with which the world conflict has presented the industrial-vehicle industry, when we are plunged into a national railway strike. And the nation, in its millions, is regaled with the spectacle of its food andesoilktransport, as safe as houses,
by virtue the Government's ownership, temporarily, of adequate fleets of motor lorries. The motor lorry enabled the millions of people in these islands to refuse to be starved by a few ,hundred thousand railway malcontents. And the Public will remember.
The railway strike effects largely negatived, and over a large part of the country conies snow in unprecedented quantity for November for many years past. And snow hammers home the lesson of mechanical haulage once again. What a snowball! I'm a bull in M.T. shares anyway. The fates appear to have constituted themselves the industry's publicity department. The world is bankrupt for transport.