Rates Inquiry Result Foregone Conclusion'
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THE RHA working party which is I collating information on costs and charges for presentation to the Prices and Incomes Board consists of Mr. P. H. R. Turner (chairman), Mr. R. H. Farmer, Mr. C. J. Palmer, Mr. J. Silbermann, Mr. J. B. Wild and Mr. E. L. Williams.
The RHA journal Roadway this month very forcibly makes the point that acceding to the Government request to postpone the rates increase is not the same thing as agreeing that haulage rates are a suitable subject for a Royal Commission to examine— which it believes they are not. It points out that the Prices and Incomes Board cannot hope to strike an average applicable to the whole of road haulage, when assessment of costs and rates in an industry of small units is so individual an exercise.
It feels that the most the Board can do in the short time available is to make a superficial survey that may or may not bear some relationship to the average haulier's business. "Mr. George Brown has set the Board an unnecessary and thankless task, for the justification for the rate recommendations of the past nine months is obvious and the result of the inquiry is a foregone conclusion."
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