" Artificial " Rates Not Wanted
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CREE hauliers do not want an 1 artificial rates level. Competition will determine economic charges. These comments were made by Mr, Bernard Wintcrbottom, national chairman of the Road Haulage Association, when he spoke at the annual dinner of the Western Area in Bristol last week. Referring to denationalization, he said that all the facts should be given to prospective purchasers and good vehicles should be sold with bad. Sales should not be limited to bad vehicles.
It was unjust that road transport should be short of capital, considering that large sums had been found for rail improvements. Money should also be made available for road development.
Judging by debates in the House of Commons, said Mr. Winterbottom, the Opposition held the view that the Association had the Minister of Transport in their grip. The R.H.A., "alas," did not have that power.
The Lord Mayor of Bristol, Ald. K. A. L. Brown, stressed the need for a Severn Bridge as a means for welding the West Country and Wales into a strong economic unit. The Government should sponsor the bridge and pay a large proportion of the cost by a grant from the Road Fund. Mr. Winterbottom thought that any suggestion that a toll bridge be built by a private company was incredible. Mr. H. Bolton, district commercial superintendent, British Railways, Western Region, mentioned the "fine understanding" between the R.H.A. and the British Transport Commission before they became subject to the mercy of politicians. There was no reason why the two should not work together again, helping each other and maintaining rates at an economic level, he said.
FUTURE PATTERN INDEFINITE
u71-11L$T hoping that vehicles sold VV back to free enterprise would give pre-war service, Mr. M. F. Barnard, chairman of the Mansion House Association on Transport, said last week that he could see no future pattern for the road transport industry.
He was speaking at the Association's annual luncheon in London. Mr. A. T. Lennox-Boyd, Minister of Transport, said that the railways' net ton-mileage today was 40 per cent. greater than before the war.
Sir Brian Robertson, chairman of the British Transport Commission, pointed out that the proposed new goods charges scheme for the railways referred to maximum rates only. Those levied would be determined between the Commission and their customers.
The B.T.C., he said, had sought the co-operation of the large trade unions to obtain economies without drastic dismissals of staff. There was much that was wrong in nationalized transport, but devoted work was going on every day.