Only Affects Class A Let there be no misunderstanding on
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this point. No national title winner can gain the top award in his own vehicle. He can only gain a national class title—which enables him to compete for the national title of "Lorry Driver of the Year." This means that the issue here does not concern the settlement of that title. It may be true that a Mini-Van driver stands more chance of winning the national Class A award, but nobody can prove it either way until next September.
' The correct answer is to create a sub-division of that class. It has already been done with articulated vehicles in Class F. Class A should be divided into Al for the vehicles which some members of the controlling body want to restrict, and A2 for the other Class A vehicles.
A memorial trophy is to be presented by the national committee for a gallant lorry driver, Mr. Tom Austin, who lost his life trying to help the victims of a terrible car crash. They cannot, at the moment, think of a suitable award for it. Why not make it the national award for the new small-van class, which The Commercial Motor suggests is the right answer to the problem?
Sight must never be lost of the real reason for sponsoring the Lorry Driver of the Year competition. It was safety. Not, as some people appear to be thinking, as a competitive rally such as the Monte-Carlo, or the Tulip. It was, too, originally called the Commercial Vehicle Driver of the Year competition. To quibble that the competition is for "lorry " drivers is ridiculous. If that argument—and it has been seriously advanced within the national committee--is taken logically, drivers of vans of all sizes, tankers, bulk .cement carriers and articulated vehicles (to mention but a few) must also be excluded because the vehicles they drive are not lorries either.
To attempt, for any reason at all, to exclude, any commercial vehicle driver from entering the contest is as wrong as anything can be.