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which it envisaged. An essential ingredient is the so-called "organisation of the transport market," which brings in the railways, the canals, tariffication and so on. The general idea—or impracticable ideal, according to taste—is to develop a transport industry which is as nearly as possibly suited to demand and meets it with ma x i mu m efficiency.
Proper qualifications for the providers of transport may assist • the task of rationalisation and should improve the quality of service. As the EEC points out, this must be in the 'interests of users, operators and the economy as a whole. From hauliers there is the additional bonus of greater road safety.
Unless it is proposed to forbid the user to carry his own goods —and there is no such proposal —the awn-account operator stands outside most of what the policy has in mind. In the UK his operating standards are controlled by the licensing system. He needs to employ or exercise skill to run his transport department properly, but failure is no different from failure in any other part of his undertaking.
• No law requires 'him to pass an examination before setting up in his main business. He is equally 'free to employ outside services or to provide some of the services from his own resources. Broad hints have been given recently that 'he 'is sometimes unwise to adopt the latter policy for his transport. Nobody goes to the point of suggesting that this should not be allowed, or that he should have to prove himself a transport expert merely perhaps to operate a fleet of vehicles on regular runs with few complications.
To quote the EEC again: "It is not necessary to include in these common rules certain kinds of transport which are of limited economic importance." To describe some own-account activities in this way may appear unkind, but one can see what is meant.