Bid for Bigger National Council of the New Haulage Association
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AN indication that Associated Road Operators was putting forward suggestions for enlarging the National, Council of the new Road Haulage Association, projectediunder the Joint Conference scheme for the .reorganization of operators' associations, with a view to widening the scope of representation, was given at the annual meeting of A:12.0.'s Leeds Sub-area. It was stated that the suggestions would provide for representation based both on numerical and geographical factors.
Mr. J. A. M. Bright, of Selby, said the suggestions were prompted by the view that the basis which the Joint Conference had recommended for operators' representation on the National Council of the new Road Haulage Association would not be satisfying to the aspirations of many, hauliers. It would seem strange if a new association, with a considerably larger membership than the ode it superseded, did • not have a larger national representation.
The amended 'basis of representation now suggested, Mr. Bright explained. was that each area of the new Road Haulage Association would be divided into voting districts or constituencies, and these districts would individually elect their own representatives to the National Council, as well as to the area committees. The lay-out of these voting districts would have regard both to numerical and geographical factors, because of the varying conditions in different parts of the country. In Yorkshire, for example, there were large numbers of hauliers concentrated in thickly populated belts of the county. On the other hand, in parts' such as Devoo and Cornwall the number of hauliers was fewer, but they 'must have representation in some form or other.
Mr. Bright, who mentioned that he had been nominated to the " Shadow Council ". which will represent t,he constituent organizations during the process of reorganization, declared that nothing more °statesmanlike than the report framed by the Joint Conference could have been produced by the road-transport or any other industry.
Mr. R. E. Britton, of Hull, chairman of A.R.O.'s Yorkshire Area, expressed confidence that any 'difficulties in con nection With local associations would be "ironed out," and said that the suggestions for larger representation on the National -Council of the new Road Haulage Association should help considerably to that end. He predicted that thousands of operators who had hitherto been disinclined to join any association, bkause of the Competition between one association and another, would enrbl under the new scheme.
There appeared to be a misapprehension on the part of many people, said Mr. Britton, that the new Federation
would be the ruling body, which would tell the three associations in the scheme
whit they had to do. On the con trary, each of the associations would have its own NationaJ Council and its own funds, and if there arose, within
the Federation, a disagreement which could' not be settled by negotiation it
would have the fight to pursue its own policy independently. Operators' sabscriptions would be paid not to the Federation but to the appropriate associations, which would allocate to the Federation such funds as were necessary for it to function.
Mr. R. G. Crowther, of F. Crowther and Sons' (Wakefield), Ltd., was elected chairman of the Sub-area, and Mx. Robert Barr, of IL Barr (Leeds), Ltd., was appointed vice-chairman.