Car drivers to blame?
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• I refer to your news story concerning front underrun protection (CM 12 Dec-2 Jan). If the "£100 driver" (car drivers) would slow down and look well ahead, they would save not only their own lives, but could save manufacturers and operators a lot of unnecessary expenses. I work for a local haulier in the Kincardineshire area and have been overtaken in some of the most dangerous pieces of road around here, with oncoming traffic and dangerously close.
Tachos should have been fitted to cars as well and then the police would be able to see who causes 80% of the traffic accidents involving HGVs.
R Gordon
Kincardineshire, existed to promote and encourage training in our industry, and that the process included a levy on all, and grants for those who train.
So it has been in the past — but this year we are required to pay a levy of £1,389, and offered a derisory £43.20 for 24 days' training which cost us nearly £1,000 in fees, wages, travelling and accommodation, not to mention lost production time.
In explanation the board points out that it is "the Government's stated policy that employers should bear a greater proportion of training costs" in this final year before the board's change of status and the phasing out of the grant/levy scheme.
To me, as we face the slings and arrows of a decimated industry, this looks like legalised robbery. Legalised it is, as pointed out by the board's solicitor whose response can be summarised as "pay up or else Is this general? If so, should we be taking it lying down?
GD Mason Managing director, GDM Transport, Engineering, Kings Lynn, Norfolk.