Single market set to slash UK costs
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• European hauliers are expected to reap a bonus worth £500m a year in savings from the abolition of customs red tape when the Single Market is introduced on 1 January.
Speaking at the RHA conference Sandy Russell of HM Customs and Excise told delegates that much of this saving will come about because of the scrapping of the Single Administration Document — "rightly named SAD", said Russell.
SAD will be replaced by a requirement for hauliers to submit periodic returns and auditbased reports. Customs paperwork will cease to be necessary from 1 April next year. In the UK alone over seven million import and export documents will no longer be required.
"Throughout the EC some 50 to 60 million documents will be lost. It's the biggest single bonfire bureaucracy has ever seen," said Russell. • The Institute of Road Transport Engineer's Scottish exhibition made its final appearance at Ingliston last week. Since becoming Scotland's premier truck show it has outgrown its surroundings and will move to the Scottish Exhibition Centre in Glasgow next time around.
A time of deep recession is not the best moment to introduce a new vehicle — but that hasn't stopped Seddon Atkinson from launching its long-awaited Strato 210 17 tonner. Iveco has supplied it with day and sleeper versions of the EuroCargo cab. Its four point coil suspension, assisted by separate shock absorbers and torsion bar at the front and integral shock absorbers at the rear, gives Seddon Atkinson a suspended cab at 17 tonnes for the first time.
More importantly, it also beats Iveco Ford's Ivecoengined SuperCargo 17-tonner into the showrooms.