Ice cold in Marsham St
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WE do take our EEC partners for granted — too much so at times. You could expect the solid anti-Marketeers, the "get us out" brigade, to flout the Treaty of Rome or ignore its content, but not the "pro" men.
Look at Bill Rodgers, our Secretary of State for Transport, and regulation 543/69. There's a real European, in the Jenkins-Thompson mould, yet he has not displayed too much of the European spirit since he took office in Marsham Street. Apart from abortive attempts to get all the chaps to speak together, he hasn't done too much in Europe.
Last week, he was reported to have said, after a recent meeting in Luxembourg, that Britain's phasing — into the hours regulations might take place under the Belgian president in October. But he doesn't know what will happen if a decision hasn't been reached by January 1 next. So British operators might find themsleves hit by an eight-hour day — and all that it means — on January 1 without any guidance from the Minister.
He says he has no contingency plans and is reported to have an air of unworried calm about the situation. Now, if Bill Rodgers thinks the French are going to give in on this issue, he should think again. His unworried calm, should be "traded in" for immediate action.
But hold on a minute, does he know something we don't know? Might it just be that we'll have another Transport Minister by January 1?
Could BR perhaps be lying back in the knowledge that we'll have an Autumn election and someone else can then decide?
I said he could only be more effective than his predecessors. I was wrong.