Do you have any titbits of industry gossip? if so,
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please contact Backfire, Commercial Motor, Rm H203, Quadrant House, The Quadrant, Sutton, Surrey SM2 5AS, or fax 020 8652 8969. Alternatively you can e-mail melanle.hammond*rbi.co.uk.
Now there's some would say hauliers must be stupid for sticking at a business that doesn't pay, but we on CM generally don't agree. We love our readers. We think they're smart—well, most of them, anyway. But even we were forced to find other words to describe the gentleman who rang us recently to complain that we had repeated some of the news items from a previous issue.
It seems he'd managed to purchase a copy of CMone Thursday, then purchased another copy of the same issue just six days later without realising Et. Shouldn't he have noticed the similarity at the point of purchase? Shouldn't he have checked the issue dates once his suspicions were aroused? Shouldn't he at least have tested his theory of fraud before ringing us to complain about our lack of professionalism? Not a bit of it!
Needless to say, he got off the phone like greased lightning when his woeful folly came to light. Sometimes, "stupid" is just far too small a word... Hauliers stopping for a much-needed break should be warned: local authorities can now apparently modify parking regulations Willie you wait.
We refer you to reports of a driver who, having parked his car legally in London, returned to find that workmen had winched it up to paint double yellow lines underneath.
The SO-year-old was equally unhappy to discover that traffic wardens—never ones to miss a juicy opportunity—had been quick to swoop on him and issue a ticket
Remembering the new trial initiative to charge utilities companies rental for digging up roads (GM 23-29 August), we ask: could this be part of a new government scheme?
You never know. But, as artics tend to be slightly more difficult to lift than your average car, truck drivers might find themselves less vulnerable to this latest revenue raiser... Three lanes of the A3 near Byfleet in Surrey could have become one almighty free-for-all last week after a 38-tonne lorry overturned on a slip road and Upped out thousands of cans of Carling Lager. A police spokesman said: "Luckily we were there in minutes, so there was no mad rush for the beer." That's being kept for the Boys in Blue's Christmas bash, then!
Tony Blair has often been a target for hauliers. With Britain's the highest fuel duty in Europe, he is often—rightly—criticised for taxing the industry to the hilt.
An AA trainee, however, took direct action a little too far when he hacked into the PM's file and renamed him Saddam Hussein while on a computer course. But his laughter faded when he found he couldn't change it back—and shut the file down in a panic.
The AA sacked him after a routine sweep picked up the changes, saying: "It was a thoughtless and stupid prank."
Some hauliers might not agree...