Musical chairs
Page 8
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"To lose one parent, Mr Worthing, may be regarded as a misfortune; to lose both looks like carelessness." If Oscar Wilde's terrifying matriarch Lady Bracknell thought it careless to lose two parents, heaven only knows what she would have made of the latest round of musical chairs at the Department of Environment, Transport & The Regions.
Within the past five months no less than three Transport Ministers have come and gone—John Reid, Helen Liddell and Glenda Jackson. Goodbye baby and Amen!
Is anyone surprised by yet another new face at the helm? After all, a transport post has always been like a revolving door: a means of getting from one place to another without slowing down. Perhaps Gus McDonald will be different, but how long has he got?
Meanwhile, the man who's supposed to be in charge of the DETR, John Prescott, has been savaged by the Transport Select Committee for achieving few tangible improvements. He's certainly done nothing for road hauliers smarting under the double whammy of ludicrously high VED and fuel tax.
It seems that nothing's happened on the way to the Forum—and hauliers like Brian Yeardley are still suffering (see news story, page 4).
Assuming that anyone could contact her, we'd like to see Mr Prescott step aside in favour of Lady Bracknell. Clearly a woman capable of striking such fear into the hearts of her friends, as well as her enemies, would be admirably suited to shaking up the dozy DETR. With her ladyship at the helm "things could only get better"; she wouldn't permit anything else.