Rates Stabilization Proceeds
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STEPS preliminary to the setting up af machinery for stabilizing haulage rates in Yorkshire were taken at a conference in Leeds, on March 2. One of the decisions was to recommend the employers' panel of the Yorkshire Joint Conciliation Board to give active support to the county committee which it is proposed to set up to deal with line stabilization of rates. At its meeting. in Leeds, on Monday, the employers' panel decided to give this support.
A small provisional committee has been appointed to examine the question of ways and means for setting up a county organization to deal with ra One of the questions raised at the eon terence, last week-end, was that of securing the observance of schedules of stabilized rates. Presumably, the county committee will approve schedules of minimum rates, which can be submitted for the information of the Yorkshire Licensing Authority. Such schedules, issued with the backing of the employers' panel of the Yorkshire Board, could be Used if objection were made to the granting of a licence, on the ground that the operator was • not charging economic rates.
The work of the existing local rates organizations will evidently be continued, with the added authority of the county committee, and their rates 'schedules co-ordinated by that body. Co-operation will, it is hoped, also be established with rates organizations in other Traffic Areas.
Doubts have been expressed in some quarters as to the expediency of establishing fixed rates, in view of intense competition from the railways, but it is argued that this consideration is far outweighed by the rate-cutting in the road-haulage business. Furthermore, the possibility of some co-ordination of rates with the railways is a. point which has seriously been raised on more than one occasion, recently, in road-transport circles.
There is no intention to establish a price " ring " in Yorkshire.