LINER-TRAIN PROBLEM NEARING SOLUTION?
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FROM OUR INDUSTRIAL ' CORRESPONDENT
THE problem of the liner trains—and of the right of private road hauliers to deliver and collect at the terminals—is nearer a solution today than at practically any time since the scheme was first mooted. And paradoxically this is one by-product of the narrowly averted threat of a full-scale railway strike.
For one of the terms of the settlement, reached in long negotiations with the Prime Minister, was an "understanding" that the whole question of negotiating machinery on the railways should be examined and that this exercise should include the possibility of linking pay to productivity.
It is here that liner trains are bound to head the list of possible productivity Pacts. In fact, it is inconceivable that any general scheme for productivity payments can be worked out which does not include agreement on this front. The chances, therefore, are that the NUR will at long last drop its opposition to private hauliers if it is offered a high enough price.
The first meeting to look into the whole wages structure of the railway industry is to be held next month and in the chair will be Mr. Wilson himself. This will underline the importance the Government attaches to the exercise. But at further meetings the chairman will be the Minister of Labour, Mr. Ray Gunter.
For the railways agreement on a full liner-train service is now becoming a matter of extreme urgency. This is highlighted by the figures for its traffic receipts for 1965 which have just been published. These show that receipts fell last year by £1,800,000 —or 0.4 per cent—to £464,400,000. But what is particularly distrubing to the railways is that this was entirely the result of a drop of 2.7 per cent—to £282,000,000—in freight income.
Improvement on Shop Fell
THE return of the snow last week to Cumberland and Westmorland left local hauliers convinced that their protest to the' Ministry of Transport over the clearing of A6 over Shap Fell in North Westmorland had had some effect.
Mr. D. H. Le Conte, Newcastle, secretary of the Northern area of the IDIA, said last week that he was convinced the authorities had been concentrating on keeping the Shop route clear, because there had been so little trouble.
An approach had been made to the Minister, said Mr. Le Conte, for a meeting to discuss hauliers' complaints over the Ship issue.
But he added that if it was not one road, It was another and he had to complain last week because A66 over Stainmore was not salted on the Yorkshire side.
The Yorkshire authorities told Mr. Le Conte that this was because the Government had not given sufficient money to maintain a 24-hour clearing service.
A spokelman for the North Riding County Authority, however, has stated that the trouble was jack of manpower and not funds.