Budget Raises Road Construction Costs
Page 34
If you've noticed an error in this article please click here to report it so we can fix it.
BECA USE of the increase in the fuel duty and the imposition of purchase tax on goods vehicles, prices of coated macadam for road construction must be raised. Mr. Cecil Martin, chairman of the Federation of Coated. Macadam Industries,made this announcement at the •Federation's annual luncheon, last week.
He added that despite cuts in Government expenditure on road con, struction and maintenance, the output of coated macadam had increased by , 54 per cent. between 1945 and 1949.
In what Brig. A. C. Hughes, president of the County Surveyors' Society, described as a typical speech by the Minister—" it hinted at so much and promised so little "—Mr. Alfred Barnes, Minister of Transport, said he doubted whether any road system in the world had had to withstand greater stress than British highways in the past 10 years. Preparations, he added, had been made for various road schemes, which could quickly be started when economic circumstances improved„ Deploring the cut in expenditure on roads, Brig. Hughes said that on the basis of the expenditure permitted to Hants County Council this year, road surfaces in the county could be relaid only once in 57 years. This was had economy. .
Mr. A. J. Lyddon, director, of the Federation, 'estimated that 75-80 per cent. of British roads incorporated coated macadam in some form.
TRIBUNAL GOES NORTII
THE .Appeal Tribunal will be sitting in the County Court, Newcastle-onTyne, on June 6, when an appeal by Anthony Mole, Ltd., against a decision Of the Northern Deputy Licensing
Authority will •he heard. .
• Next day the Tribunal will sit in the Law Courts, York, to hear an appeal by Messrs. L. F. Robinson against a decision of The Yorkshire Deputy Licensing Authority.