Togetherness pays
Page 13
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One of the most encouraging results of the establishment of the much-maligned Road Transport Industry Training Board has been the appearance of group training schemes. There are now no fewer than 44 on the RTITB's register or in an advanced stage of preparation, of which about half are in road haulage. Not only do these groups offer the obvious and expected benefits of pooled resources: in some eases they may well become the path by which operational, and even financial, grouping becomes established in road haulage. In so many cases the training group will spotlight and identify the needs which grouping can fulfil: in maintenance of vehicles, for example, or in flexibility of driving and other staff duties. Every costing exercise which the training scheme involves will tend to highlight the potential economies to be derived from shared staff and shared equipment—which otherwise would be too expensive for an individual firm to buy.
But these are bonus effects; training itself is justification enough for grouping, as this week's Management Matters emphasizes. The North West has been particularly lively on this front, and will therefore be one of the first areas to benefit in ways which are becoming increasingly important. It is no idle comment when the regional training manager says of road haulage: "If management skills are inadequate, some of the firms won't exist in five -years' time".
Had training boards been established in isolation from other influences, such a forecast might have been laughed off. But with intervention by the Prices and Incomes Board, dire labour problems and widespread unrest, and a whole host of new legislation the haulage industry is under tremendous pressure to increase efficiency and tackle urgent problems concerning organization, finance and labour relations. In these circumstances, group management training is an opportunity that should be welcomed with open arms.
Immediate returns
One aspect of training which embraces both management and staff, and which we hope will be given urgent consideration by the RTITB, is operating practices. This is a field in which good, bad and indifferent methods tend too often to be passed on indiscriminately, and in which new techniques can be passed over by busy people already overstretched by day-to-day burdens. For example, the new SMMT artic categorization scheme could well be taken as one subject for practical RTITB instruction. Another urgent subject is safety training.
Last week on a suburban dual-carriageway we came upon the grim aftermath of a grisly accident. An attic laden with metal pipes had collided with the vehicle in front. It was bad enough that the front of the tractive unit had been staved in and the pillars of the shattered windscreen pushed back; compounding the disastrous results of collision, the pipes had shot forward, reducing the upper half of the cab to a metal shambles and penetrating to within inches of the steering wheel.
It is none of our concern here whether the load shifted because the collision happened at excessive speed, or the driver failed to observe company instructions about loading, or the haulier failed to specify proper loading standards for the carriage of notoriously difficult loads like pipes. The accident happened; and every day one sees loads of pipes, steel, timber and containers in which regard for safety appears more token than real. Equally, one sees a vast number of properly secured consignments. What is needed is training based on a code of practice, preferably drawn up jointly by operators and the Training Board.