Anything to put up costs
Page 23
If you've noticed an error in this article please click here to report it so we can fix it.
"A REMARKABLE lack of trust and co-operation between Community authorities" in the movement of goods is observed by the European Communities Commission. It is expressed in interminable delays at border posts for compulsory and optional checks and qualitycontrol tests.
"Unnecessary frontier transit costs incurred in intraCommunity road haulage alone" have been estimated at £210 million a year, excluding administration costs, customs clearance, auditing agencies and so on. A committee of experts from EEC countries believed that these costs could be reduced by 30-50 per cent.
This should cause no surprise when one reads that "in a not unusual example" a consignment of fresh meat travelling by the Brenner route took 261/2 hours to get from Munich to Verona, including customs clearance in West Germany, Austria and Italy. A load of scrap travelled the same route in 41/2 hours. A few more journeys like that and the meat would also be scrap.
If, of course, the food (of which the EEC encourages excessive production at exorbitant prices) is allowed to go rotten in transit, it will not have to be sold at knock-down prices to the Community's potential enemies.