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COMMERCIAL MOTOR

2nd September 1919
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Page 1, 2nd September 1919 — COMMERCIAL MOTOR
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The Essential Motor Industry —a German Opinion.'

IT IS A national habit of ours to attach more itnportance to the vieWs of foreign experts than to those of our own people, however well informed. Consequently, it may serve a useful purpose to draw attention to some of the statements contained in Ludenaorff's book, a precis of which has been recently published in The Times. Presumably, no one would question Ludendorff's ability as a military organizer or the value of his experience as indicating what is, or what is not, necessary to the successful prosecution of war.

He dealt at some length with the merits and domerits of the Tank. Admittedly,, the Germans were short of this weapon, and it is now explained to us why that shortage was permitted to continue. "The automobile industry was fully occupied in turning out motor lorries, and we (the Germans) did not possess enough of these vehicles to be able, like the Entente, to withdraw the infantry for long periods from the impressions of the battlefield, to billet the men in comfort, and yet have them on the spot in good time. For this reason, I attached the greatest importance to, the supply of motor lorries. If our fuel situation should be unsatisfactory, then also our stocks of fuel must be increased. The construction of motor lorries could not be allowed to suffer. We could not do enough for the reinforcement and conveyance of our infantry by motor lorries. It was a recurring sore point with the various Army Headquarters that they had not a sufficient number of these vehicles at their disposal. When the Chiefs of Staff complained to me about the difficulties of supply, especially in the case of ammunition, which they attributed to the deficiency of motor lorries, and when I objected that the lorries were there, the answer I got was that the infantry had had to be carried."

Subsequently, it is explained that, despite the importance-of motor lorries, some consideration was in fact given to the Tank question. The point is, however, that Ludendorff obviously attaches infinitely more importance to the adequacy of the supply of motor transport than to the possession of that far more spectacular and publicly admired weapon, the Tank. In this respect, he helps us to arrive at a true perspective and re-enforces the views of those who fully .realize that a strong automobile industry is necessary to any great military power. • Clearly, the German motor industry was not large enough. It could, not even supply a sufficiency of its more or less normal products. Still less could it meet the situation when it. was required -to supply also new weapons of war, the need for which had not been anticipated. Prior to the war we, as a nation, hopelessly underestimated our military requirements in respect of motor vehicles. Neither did we foresee how essential our motor industry would be to us in respect of the production of aero engines, Tanks, and other weapons an4 munitions for the manufacture of which the motor industry is peculiarly suited. Mr. Lloyd George, in his recent speech, did not give much encouragement to those who would like to believe that all wars are ended, or at least ending, for ever. His analysis of what constitutes a key industry was based upon an entirely opposite conclusion. Nevertheless, there appears to be no intention in official quarters to regard the manufacture of commercial motor vehicles as a key industry, despite the fact that these vehicles are just as essential to the maintenance of civilian trade and transport, as they are to the proper organization of armies in the field.

A Point for the Workers. . IN A MEMORANDUM recently published on import duties and the engineering industry, addressed to the Prime Minister by Mr. D. A. Brender, 0.11E., Director of the British Engineers' Association, stress is laid upon an argument which we feel has not hitherto been sufficiently accentuated. The engineering industry is the greatest of all key industries, without which every department of our national life would be paralysed. Even if this were not the ease and we had merely to exercise a free choice of industries to be specially encouraged and developed, we should be compelled to the selection of the engineering industry in the first instance. The main reason_ for this is that it is a high-wage industry and one of the few to afford any prospect of fulfilling, tO any substantial extent, the present-day standard of life expectations of manual workers. In 1906 the average weekly earnings of men in the metal, shipbuilding and engineering trades was approximately 24s. Next came the building and wood-working trades at 32s. and the clothing trade at 30s. The avezage earnings in the textile trades were only about 28s. Moreover, the most highly-paid group was also that which employed the largest number of men. These figures are, of course, quite obsolete, though they will still serve as a fair basis of comparison. Now, it is perfectly clear that an abnormal high wages cost cannot possibly exist alongside of an

unchecked inducement to the wage-earner to spend his money on competitive foreign products. So long as there are other countries in which the wages cost per unit of value produced is lower than it is here, the natural inclination to purchase in the lowest market, and, therefore, from .abroad, must be artificially checked. The country which pays highly for production is naturally handicapped in neutral markets. In 'these it cannot compete until it has either reduced its scale of wages or else materially increased its standard of individual production.

Thus the industries in such a country are forced back into large dependence upon the home markets. If even the home markets will not take 'up the output, then the industry must be completely unstable and unemploYment on an increasing scale is inevitable. The men so thrown out of work must seek employment in other industries, if that which they have left. was already better paid than any other, this obviously means that they will be compelled to accept a lower remuneration and to reduce their standard of living.

Operating in Three Dimensions Instead of Two.

THE INQUIRY which is now being made into Mr. Gattie's Central Clearing House Scheme is attracting very considerable public attention to the unsatisfactory congestion prevalent in docks and railway goods yards and to the possibility of effecting improvement by revolutionary change of method.

Some time ago we dealt in considerable detail with the system proposed by Mr. Gattie. From personal observation, we can vouch for the fact that the first small experimental installation works extremely well. It is, of course, impossible to say as yet whether serious difficulties will arise in the event of the entire scheme being tried upon a gigantic scale such as would be necessary were it adopted to serve as a distributing centre for the whole of London's goods traffic.

There is, however, one matter of principle illustrated by Mr. Gattie's proposals which it seems to tts must necessarily be introduced in any system which is to confer real benefit. At present the work of sorting and of loading is carried on to all intents and purposes in two dimensions. We do, of course, use to a limited extent machinery in the nature of cranes to lift goods from one place and lower them again to another. Nevertheless, almost the whole of the • work is done on or near ground level. The result is that the distance through Which goods have to be moved during sorting and loading processes is unnecessarilygreat.

If we were to plan a town consisting solely of single-storey bungalows, we should obviously have to cover an immense area in order to include a really large population. One of the consequences would be that the average distance betw.een any two members of the population would be comparatively great. If we provide all the means of communication on ground level we should again have to reserve a big area for roads railways and so on. We can only concentrate by utilizing height as well as length and breadth.

Even now we do not attempt to provide all our means of communication upon one level. The average man going to business uses a lift or its equivalent three or four times between his home and his office. In the sorting and loading of goods we have tried to get on without having resort to what is found necessary in everyday life in any considerable city. Mr. Gattie has realized that any sorting system to be rapid and efficient must be conducted in a building consisting of a considerable number of floors with rapid means of communication .between them. Without expressing any opinion as to whether his system i of communication s the best possible, we must at least admit that this principle is right. As applied to the development of motor transport, one of the principal effects of the introduction of Mr. Gattie's method would be to encourage the general employment of rapidly attachable and detachable bodies on goods-carrying motors. By using such bodies, loading delays may be immensely reduced. The one load may be taken nff whole and immediately replaced by the second load prepared in advance. It is only by some such scheme that a vehicle can be employed during almost the whole of its working day upon its legitimate business, which is that of conveying loads frompoint to point. At present, we lose much economy by allowing valuable machinery to stand idle while the body which it carries is being loaded or unloaded and the chassis is merely fulfilling the function of a loading stage.

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