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WHATEVER the result of the General Election the need for co-operation between rail and road operators will remain. At loading banks of goods stations this necessity has always been selfevident, whatever the extent of differences at national level.
Soon there will be need for greater co-operation at local level. Despite political expediency, reorganization of British Railways will proceed. And inevitably there must be parallel reorganization of road transport.
Already the first of the new mechanized coal depots is ,operating. while liner train depots and a streamlining of the goods station pattern will form part of BR's drive for economic full-train working.
Is the haulier doing sufficient qnickly enough to prepare for these developments? At the annual dinner of the R.H.A. North Devon subarea at Barnstaple last week doubts were raised. The national chairman, Mr. D. 0. Good, admitted that tripartite talks between the Association, B.R. and B.R.S. were still continuing at "the highest level ". But—like Mr. Jeremy Thorpe, M.P.—the rank and file will be interested to know how these protracted discussions are progressing. It is their livelihood that will be affected—and affected soon.
Above all they will want to know the answer to the key question – who is going to be the boss in the combined service soon to be offered to trade and industry? Mr. Thorpe thought it would be a bad thing if the railways were the master and the hauliers_the agent. Mr. P. B. Browne, M.P. and local operator, went further: because the haulier has direct contact with the customer, he should employ B.R. as sub-contractor and not the other way round.
How very true. Otherwise hauliers will become merely the buffer for the shortcomings of others.