A tangled web The blanket of fog which covers South
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East England this week is as nothing compared with the foggy chaos of Common Market legislation into which our road transport industry has been plunged. Unless a legal rabbit is pulled swiftly out of the hat, from January 1 there will be no law, in Britain to enforce the driving hours regulations on vehicles over 3.5 tonnes gvw.
Britain's repeated failure to obtain deferment of the EEC law not only puts operators into an impossible situation—with indecision on tachographs as well as hours—but raises the worrying possibility of illegal operation by irresponsible firms and drivers exploiting the legal vacuum.
Even if some last-minute action is taken to introduce enforcement legislation, there will have to be a settling-in period of non-enforcement to give employers and men time to adapt. The Transport Minister is pressing Government lawyers for a choice of legal options so that he can put the Department's plans before Parliament recesses this week. Whatever action is taken, nothing can disguise the fact that Britain is in a mess of its own making. We were given three years deferment on the EEC legislation and frittered the time away. Since the Referendum, the DoE's confident expectations have been repeatedly dashed by the Common Market Ministers and the Commission. Whether this was due to a poor reading of the Continental mind or to a punitive attitude in Brussels, British transport operators are suffering the results of a major legislative failure which must never be allowed to happen again.