IICOMMENT FRESH DIRECTIONS?
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• Labour's 'Fresh Directions' transport poli( y document provides some interesting reading — not least because it is filled with such flowing phrases as: "A sensibly planned transport policy will have a decisive effect on the quality of our environment and on the safety of our people. It is also essential for the regeneration of the national economy, for effective regional development and for the creation of jobs."
Few people could argue with those sentiments or could they? After the first four pages of similar literary gems, the document gets down to what the Labour Party would like to do to the road freight industry — and it wants to do a lot.
Extra enforcement to catch cowboy operators is certainly needed, but ham-stringing operators by banning all through-traffic on minor roads and restricting night movements will make it even more difficult for hauliers to keep to the right side of the environmental lobby, if not the law.
Labour also wants to transfer responsibility for issuing 0-licences to local authorities, but could they run it any better than the current system, directly-controlled by the DTp?
The FTA, which certainly has its own axe to grind, says the suggestion "fills it with horror." The FTA is not likely to be the only one.
If Labour really wants to get the confidence of the road transport industry perhaps it would do hotter to drop the rhetoric, and actually explain how it proposes to put its ideas into action.