The Budget : Efforts to Enforce Annual. Licence Fees on Heavy Motors.
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There are various rumours afloat concerning the wish of some members of the Cabinet to see annual • licence fees fOr heavy motorcars introduced into the forthcoming Budget. It is scarcely a good time, we think, to begin to place such annual taxes upon internal transport, having regard to the congestion of railways, the shortage of labour, and the cumulative handicaps under which traffic of all kinds is now conducted. Unfavourable conditions and working costs have undoubtedly grown worse of late, and we trust that Mr. McKenna will condemn the proposals which we are told he is at least considering. The demands and needs of the road authorities of the country can neither be satisfied nor met by such taxation as that which we hear is contemplated, unless the proceeds are earmarked for and applied to road 'construction and maintenance. Such allocation of the proceeds is certainly most unlikely, having regard to the fact that the current income of the Road Board is already diverted to the State coffers for ordinary Exchequer purposes. It is for this reason that we feel users must be advised stoutly to oppose the suggestion for heavy annual taxes upon commercial motors at the present juncture. The vehicles are not fit subjects of taxation for ,war purposes, apart from the fact that any annual yield must be relatively small. • The Right Hon. Walter H. Long, M.P., President of the Local Government Board, gave an intimation, a few weeks agog of his decision not to proceed with the appointing of a Joint Select Committee of both Houses of Parliament, to consider the case for and against the annual taxation of motorbuses and ather commercial matters, until he was in possession of the report of the L.G.B. Technical Committee. We cannot discern, from any information which is at our diSposal, and to much of which we are unable to refer in print, the existence of any valid reason for a change of view in favour of hurried legislation. Any such taxation by Budget resolution and as part of the coming Finance Bill will be a .direct .contradiction of the considered view which. Parliament :adopted before the strain of war was upon the cabinet. We refer to the decision that the matter of such annual taxation demanded in.imatigation by a Joint Committee of that importance before a decision could be safely reached.
We have ourselves been called upon, during the . past few weeks, to furnish certain Government 1)e partrnents with estimates and statistics concerning eommerciat motors of all classes. N.Ve gladly gave the information, to the best of our ability, although at the time no hint was given to us that we were being asked to co-operatei in the preparation of data upon which taxation may hereafter be based. The figures which we furnished were probably sought at our hands merely as a check upon other records which have been compiled from L.G.B. and Excise Records.
We have have been, since early last week, actively participating in numerous consultations and discus sions anent the suggested Budget clauses and resolu tions. concerning these projected licence fees for 'commercial motors. There is a sharp division of opinion, we do not hesitate to admit, between different users on the one hand, and between different members of the motor-manufaeturing industry on the others. Some leaders in 'each. section favour acquiescence in proposals for an annual licence fee, provided such new 'charge is coupled with a satisfactory settlement of all outstanding points in road user : other prominent users and manufacturers are ready to resist all suggestions .f or any 'further .charge upon petrol-driven vehicles, and with this contention we ourselves most cordially agree._ When one comes to consider the case of the steam wagon, one again finds a division of opinion, but the balance of view undoubtedly favonrs consent toi reasonable annual tax, subject to the aforementioned safeguard about road matters. We have speci fically heard that an annual tax of least £30 per vehicle is suggested for steel-tired steam lorries, find one of at least £15 per annum for each similar vehicle when shod with rubber tires. We are not able, however, to vouch for the exact point to which such recommendations have progressed at the moment of going to press.
Letters of Protest Wanted.
We have this specific suggestion to make to our supporters. Let each and every one of them send. a letter of protest forthwith to the local member of Parliament. Let that communication press the member to see a Cabinet Minister, Mr. McKenna. or Mr. Long for preference, without delay, and to urge the fact that commercial transport is in no position to stand extra burdens in these times of war stress, and above all unable in the absence of contemporary settlement:otroad legislation. It will be difficult, it not impossible, unless both matters are now considered together, to avoid the creation of a position of extreme hardship for a high percentage of users throughout the country.. There is no desire, we feel sure, on the part of commercialmotor users generally to escape even a further share of the cost of paying for the war. A scheme for heavy licence fees surely disregards the present condition of our highways. Their state is a sufficient burden upon users, by reason of the consequential delays and extra consumptions, to say nothing of extra wear and tear on the vehicles, without any added charge in the shape of an annual licence fee.
We conceive that the outstanding questions of road construction and maintenance cannot possibly be settled for several years to come, and we contend that there should he no annual taxation until the whole of the laws and regulations can be properly codified and comprehensively treated. • The user should not he hit twice—by bad roads and by new taxes which are not applied to them.
Trailers and the U.S.A. Boom in Them.
In America, the unconventional is a magnet which draws the manufacturer and designer irresistibly. In the applied science of mechanical road haulage it is as true as in so many other more familiar directions. State regulation as distinet from national regulation makes for individual development—albeit of confusion oft-times. Axle-weights and many similar mechanical characteristics are much less legally restricted than in our own country. As a consequence we find all manner of attempts being made in directions which our own Motor Car Acts preclude.
This is particularly noticeable in respect of the tractor. The small steam five-ton machine, which has been found so useful on the roads of Great Britain, is almost—if not entirely—unknown in the United States, but the oil-engine tractor, ranging from the huge multi-cylinder machine which had a few years ago so great a boom for agricultural purposes, down to the smaller unit which was adapted to support the front portion of any ordinary horse wagon with its fore-carriage removed, has received, a great deal of attention and achieved a marked degree of successful operation.
As with tractors, so with trailers, and at the present time there is a distinct boom in America in the .direction of the employment of light spring-mounted trailers for haulage behind ordinary motorcars. In this issue we publish a description of one of these types, wheli will suffice to illustrate this class of development. It is a peculiar anomaly to find, upon consideration, that a trailer of this kind, or alter neatively of the castor-wheel kind, Which has already been produced in this country, although used to a very small extent, can legally be towed at the rate of 20 miles an hour. The advisability of such permission is doubtful, and certainly to date very little advantage has been taken of this facility.
We are not very hopeful of the financial advantage of this method, especially if it be intended to run at the full legal speed. It has to be remembered that the additional effect on rubber tires, and particularly on pneumatics; will increase the cost per mile-run in that respect to a very serious extent. Few frames and axles are constructed to resist, without damage, a-16 the additional strain imposed in starting away with a towed load controlled by one or more attachments to the trailer. Considerations of this sort, however, do not weigh so materially at the present time as demands for necessary transport facilities are so insistent and the means to meet them by no means adequate, that it will doubtless while war goes on be found frequently:economical to incur additional running costs providing that the necessary haulage can be effected in some way or another. Therefore, the light form of trailer suggested in this issue may offer facilities on the British_market which may be of great utility during the obtaining circumstances.
Extension of Import Duties.
The prospects of an import duty on commercial motors and their parts continue to be good. This probability is as British manufacturers wish things to ,be. Producers are, from Thames to Clyde, protectionists now, although we still hear of professing free-traders in parts of Yorkshire.
We have dwelt on various occasions, during the plat few months, with the weakening of influences which weighed with the Chancellor of the Exchequer • in September last, and which influences; chiefly of American origin, persuaded him to abandon for the time beirlg the inclusion of commercial motors in the Tariff list, at the same time that French influences resulted in the exclusion of tires from that list. The commitments of the War Office to America are relatively small, compared with their extent six months ago.
American makers and their representatives, so far as we have conversed with them on the likelihood of the extension of the import duties to include their goods, do not appear to be much perturbed. They have the precedent of .successful trade in Canada to reassure them, and they naturally draw parallels between possibilities of trade against a 33t per cent. ad valorem duty in the United Kingdom as against a 45 per cent, duty in Canada. This hopefulness, and the inferential intention to fight in. order to keep a hold on the British market, is not without direct interest to users.
The determination of importers of American private cars to take a share in the utility business has already been demonstrated, both as regards chassis which were originally imported avowedly for commercial purposes, and as regards large numbers of other chassis, upon which, on a fresh classification .after landing, a rebate of duty was subsequently obtained.