Unity at Last in Road Transport
Page 37
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By E. B. Howes,
Liaison Between the RHA. and All Other Haulage Associations Makes Unity a Fact as Well as a Word
II HAVE great pleasure in announcing that I have agreed to act as liaison officer between the R.H.A. and its allied bodies on the one hand and other haulage associations on the other. This means that, with Mr. Duffield and myself as spearheads, the whole of the road transport industry, 100 per cent. strong, will go into action to fight nationalization.
We shall tight that fight, not merely on behalf of the thousands of individual hauliers who will be dispossessed and impoverished if we lose; not merely for the preservation of our industry; not even solely for the benefit of the general trade and industry of the country, which would suffer an immeasurable setback if transport be nationalized. It will be for the country as a whole, as we sincerely believe that the services of a free, enlightened, and efficient transport system is essential to its prosperity.
We believe that the desired efficiency can be obtained only if transport stays substantially in the hands of those who controlled it in pre-war days. Its efficiency under private control is proven; it has undergone the hard and exacting test of employment at the hands of trade and industry, and has come through with flying colours. Road transport in the hands of Government -officials has also been tried and has fallen lamentably short of the high standard set by private enterprise.
One of the things we shall do will be to produce incontrovertible proof of the truth of that statement, taking steps to place the facts before the general public so that they may judge and, by the pressure of their opinion, force the Government to acknowledge the error of its ways and abandon this ill-conceived and wrong-headed plan.
Plans for the Fight Against Nationalization
This complete union of all parties and associations in our industry, unprecedented in its history, is yet another of the fruits of the Caxton Hall meeting. Shortly after that event I had the pleasure of meeting Mr. R. Sewill, following which I attended a meeting of the Public Relations Committee of the R.H.A., when I was well received.
Ways and means for pressing on with the fight against nationalization were discussed, and one of them was the decision announced in the opening to this article. Incidentally, I would like to place on record my appreciation of the full and unreserved co-operation of Mr. Sewill in this matter.
What are our plans? They can be summed up in 'few words.
Mr. Alfred Barnes, Minister of War Transport, has stated that it is not the intention of the Government to hold a public inquiry into the status of the road-transport industry, so that its efficiency may be factually determined, and the case for and against nationalization formally determined on the basis of the findings of the Committee of Inquiry.
We shall take such steps as will force Mr. Barnes to hold such an inquiry.
At the same time we shall ourselves hold such an inquiry and make it public much more completely and effectively than could any Government Department. We have, within the industry, and available for our purpose, all the statistical information necessary to that end.
We have ample data as to the actual cost of moving traffics
of all kinds and description under private enterprise, and, per contra, under the control of the Road Haulage Organization. We shall show what is the cost in each case, taking care, in the latter instance, to add to the prime cost the overweighted expenditure on the maintenance of a Government Department necessary to run the organization. We shall be. able, quite easily, to show that, on cost alone, Government-operated road transport stands condemned.
We shall do more than that; we shall produce comparative data indicating the efficiency of the service rendered, the promptitude of collection and delivery—or lack of it—we shall inquire into such matters as waste mileage and loss of vehicle-use owing to misdirection and the red-tape-bound methods of officialdom.
We shall draw comparison between the conditions of employment of drivers under the two divergent managements. We shall take the testimony of the drivers themselves, for the majority of them is sound in the knowledge of what can and should be done in road transport.
We are not afraid of the outcome of any of these investigations, and we shall take steps to give them the widest possible publicity. Indeed, that is the second part of our plans—to take the public into our confidence and tell it the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, about these matters. To that end we are going to enlist the aid of many trade associations, outside our own industry.
Many "Caxton Hall" Meetings to be Held
We shall hold "Caxton Hall" meetings all over the country, commencing, on January 6, at Rochdale, and culminating in a mass meeting at the Albert Hall, London.
We shall invite the co-operation of the national and local Press, so freely and copiously afforded in the case of the Caxton Hall meeting, and we do not doubt that we shall get it. In this connection I would like to take this opportunity of endorsing and supporting the views of the Editor of "The Sunday Times," that it is high time the meagre ration of newsprint be increased, so that our Press can give adequate space to the discussion of the many vital issues now before the public. It is little short of a scandal that, with so many things of importance transpiring, the newspapers should -be unable, because of lack of space, to keep the people fully informed.
We shall not, in any of these enterprises, be half-hearted; this is an all-out effort. Appeasement in any degree is quite unacceptable to us, and foreign to our ideas. We shall not, for instance, follow the example of Sir Herbert Matthews, who, when addressing the Institute of Traffic Administration, first suggested a Royal Commission fearlessly to investigate the whole transport situation, and tamely added that he had not much faith that his appeal would be listened to by the Government. We say that such an investigation is necessary; we demand it, and we shall get it.
Mr. Barnes has asked us not to pull our punches. We shall not do so. At the back of our minds there is the idea that when he put that request Mr. Barnes did not anticipate that we should be able to produce such a " world-beater " as is embodied in this new and complete link-up of all our forces; he never thought we should be able to put such weight behind our blows.