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Bill tightens control Df operating centres

6th February 1982
Page 3
Page 3, 6th February 1982 — Bill tightens control Df operating centres
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,TRICTER environmental controls on goods vehicle operation are sing proposed by Transport Secretary David Howell in the Transort Bill published last week. They have already drawn unfavourale comments from the industry, reports ALAN MILLAR.

In a move calculated to swee)n the pill of increased lorry 'eights which he wants his onservative back-bench col!agues to swallow, Mr Howell as accepted the Foster Commitie's 1978 recommendations la much tighter controls be imased on operating centres. The Bill seeks powers to make censing Authorities specify the imber, type, and size of lorries id trailers to be kept at any )erating centre or ancillary )erations site used by an )erator's licence holder.

LAs will also be able to specify e parking arrangements to be -ovided at any one centre, the )urs at which the site can be ;ed, and the routes to be used r access to such a centre. Any 0-licence holder who ;es an unspecified operating ,ntre or ancillary site will be ible to a fine of up to £200, and ly contravention of conditions tached to an 0-licence will at)ct a fine of up to £500.

The Bill seeks powers for LAs revoke, suspend, or curtail an licence where an operator ntravenes these conditions or here external conditions ange and affect the environent around an operating ntre or ancillary base.

And it wants LAs to be able to ry any environmental condiins attached to an 0-licence or :ach conditions where envinmental factors demand am.

Mr Howell has also taken the portunity of clearing up the ubt which followed the 1975 .sh and McCall case by redeing an operating centre as the ice where vehicles are norilly kept when not in use. :ommenting on the Bill, Mr well said: "This will help to move lorries from being rked in residential roads tside the homes of the smal, often one-man dperator who erates from there.

'I am pleased that this Bill proles me with an early opportuy to take action on this small t important element in our ieral objective of civilising the heavy lorry," he added.

On the other hand, Freight Transport Association deputy director-general Garry Turvey was less enamoured of the Bill's proposals, saying: "This really gets LAs into the province of transport management."

He said that the Bill goes too far by specifying such factors as the type of vehicles to be operated, and added: "We have never accepted that the environmental problem needed that degree of interference."

Mr Turvey went on to say that as this part of the Bill's provisions are tucked away at the end, after the politically sensitive powers to privatise the National Bus Company (see p23) and goods vehicle test stations, there is little likelihood of it being debated in the House of Commons.

In view of this, he said that the FTA is disappointed by the Government's failure to consult the industry about the plan, as it had already made clear that it disliked its inclusion in the Foster Report.

At that time, the FTA suggested that, at very least, there should be powers to compensate any operator which is forced out of an established site, in a fashion similar to the compulsory powers provisions in planning legislation.

• Fixed penalties p16.


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