SMALL TRUST IN PRIME HAULIERS Imagine your business is on
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the brink of collapse. What's your next move? For over half of the nation's hauliers this may not be just a silly role-playing exercise. According to the latest Plimsoll Report on Transport, 56% of all UK operators face ruin unless they undertake rapid financial restructuring. Easier said than done when you consider that average pre-tax profits in the business are now just 2.4% of turnover. Perhaps the answer to business stability for small operators lies in working for larger "prime hauliers", like the operation being set up by British Steel. Or perhaps not. We've yet to hear a good word for these types of management contracts from CM readers. If such partnerships are to work it has to be on the basis of mutual respect and a decent "comfortable" rate—from the very top to the very bottom. Many a true word spoken in jest? In a fax sent over to Commercial Motor this week the Freight Transport Association called for "the protection of legitimate operators while irradiating (sic) the cowboys". Within minutes a new version was dispatched demanding "the protection of legitimate operators while eradicating the cowboys". We prefer the first version. A lethal dose of gamma rays is probably the only way the UK transport industry will ever be rid of those operators who cynically and consistently break the law on Britain's roads. nd finally.. .are we alone in seeing the irony in the fact that the French legal system seems perfectly capable of arresting, convicting and locking up English soccer hooligans within two days, while holding so many UK lorry drivers accused of hauling drugs without charge or trial for months on end? And how come the French authorities can deport football thugs within a week, but are seemingly unable to sort out the paperwork and pay compensation for last year's drivers' strike? Surely what's sauce for the goose—in any language— is sauce for the gander?