Lorry bunching
Page 32
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As chairman of the Road Haulage Association highways and traffic committee. I may perhaps be able to explain why we made a reference to lorry bunching to be included and emphasized in the next edition of Highway Code.
Whether or not the Code is read as widely as it should be, the recommendations that it gives do acquire a certain force, if only because they are regarded as official. This helps operators in impressing the point on their drivers: it enables the RHA to make special reference in its driver's manual and other publications. The material would fall naturally to be used by the RTITB in the way you suggest
(CM August 14, "Don't punish teach'') and there are, of course, other possibilities for publicity which would arise, for example if and when the RHA proposal to the Ministry of Transport is accepted and included in the next Highway Code edition.
In my own opinion every encouragement ought to be given to all drivers, whether experienced or not, to study and learn the Highway Code. Clearly this is less..likely to happen if people regard it, in your words, as a -toothless documentwith no legal backing. Surely its value lies partly in its non-statutory status. Indeed there is no sensible form of words in which an injunction against lorry bunching could be written into the regulations. GEORGE E. TELFER, T. & S. Transport, EdiRburgh.