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20th February 2003
20th February 2003
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Page 1, 20th February 2003
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Page 4

FTA says smart-card tack's

doomed by system glitches m by Emma Penny and Brian Weatherley The move to introduce smart-card tachographs from August 2004...

Howell maintenance risks 0-licence loss

• A South Wales operator fined 130,000 for serious health and safety breaches after its truck was involved in a fatal pile-up...

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CM: Charging Ms makes life dearer

• As London's congestion charge system was launched on Monday, CM geared up its campaign against commercial vehicles having to...

Court rejects income suit

• David Armishaw, who sued the North Western Traffic Commissioner Beverley Bell and a member of the Traffic Area staff over...

Adams ejected from TPN

• Pallet firm The Pallet Network (TPN) has moved to head off criticism of lax vetting procedures by moving to dismiss its...

Remains left to rot

• One Of the UK's largest healthcare waste disposal companies has been fined £100,000 after loading trailers with human...

T81,13 chills Salvesen

About 180 staff at Christian Salvesen's Livingston operations will move to Tibbett and Britten next month, following a...

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Congestion charge: 'a bloody shambles'

CM SPECIAL REPORT London's much-talked about congestion charge came into force this Monday. Will it I work? And what problems...

The operators that the system forgot

• Transport for London (TfL) has agreed to a number of concessions for hauliers after it failed to set-up hundreds of payment...

Tories wage war on charge

• The Conservatives have pledged to scrap congestion charging if a Tory candidate wins the London Mayoral election next May....

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Council fights charge

• Westminster City Council is continuing to fight the London congestion charge despite losing Its court case challenging the...

Double whammy for reefers

• The number of businesses in the temperature controlled distribution industry is set to plummet with the arrival of congestion...

Charge fuels search for alternative

• Interest in alternative-fuel vehicles has risen with the introduction of London's congestion charge. With many...

We will all pay price

It's one of the biggest experiments in Britain and, at 7am Monday morning, it looked as if London's congestion charge might...

Green Group swims against tide

• The London Assembly Green Group says lorries should be charged E15 to enter central London. It says the increased charge...

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RNA anger at NI duty freeze

• by Dominic Perry The Road Haulage Association has reacted with fury to the government's refusal to implement the...

Tyre dumping continues

• The Environment Agency is urging hauliers to be on their guard when disposing of tyres following a spate of roadside tyre...

Ecopoint future still undecided

• The extension of Austria's ecopoint regulation—which restricts the number of lorries that can cross its ecologically...

Scots face longer terms

• Truck drivers in Scotland who cause fatal accidents through dangerous driving or while under the influence of drugs or...

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Crash rate drops at speed camera sites

• by Jennifer Ball Drivers could face more speed cameras after a government report showed that the number of people killed or...

110m load is fishy

• A Customs & Excise sting has led to six men being jailed for a total of 94 years for cocaine trafficking. An artic being...

Council overloading

11 Ashfield District Council has been fined £5,600 for gross overloading of eight of Its refuse trucks at a Nottingham...

Minimum EU fuel tax is barely half a deal says BHA

• The Road Haulage Association's chief executive has described the expected agreement on an EU-wide minimum tax rate on fuel as...

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POt French security still too lax

• The Professional Drivers' Association claims that the French authorities are still failing to crackdown on asylum seekers,...

Bristol-based 011is Transport has surthe very high service levels guaranteed

by prised some In the Industry by announcing it 011is to its customers, but their pricing Is resigning from a national...

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Fuel credit terms stiffened

Commercial Motor readers are facing tightening credit terms on their biggest cost—fuel. Chris Tindall investigates, and asks...

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10-year switch

Truck manufacturers can't hope to have the right truck for every possible occasion, particularly when it comes to custom-made...

COST SAVING CASE STUDY

• Inter UK Engineering recently supplied an unusual 8x2 Scania conversion to specialist carrier Lift 'n Shift, which operates...

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WORK IN PROGRESS • Amongst the 'work in progress' when

Commercial Motor visited Inter UK was the conversion of a 3.8m wheelbase Ivaco 400E38 EureTech 4x2 tractor into a 6.4m rigid....

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Campaign for longer fridges

Je by Colin Barnett Transfrigoroute, the European trade body for the temperature-controlled transport industry, has launched a...

SPECIAL EINT1011 Vauxhall has added a new version of the

Vivaro to its line-up. The special edition Sportive comes with alloy wheels, air-conditioning, radio/CD player and sliver...

TELEMATES GUIDE

A guide to telematics for operators has been published by the TransportEnergy Best Practice programme, Contact: 0845 602 1425...

LIMITER WARNING

Operators are reminded that the new procedures for testing speed limiters during the annual test came Into force on 14...

WEB MAKE

Close Motor Finance has launched a new website (www. closemotorfinance.co.uk) to provides details of its financial Information...

LEX DEFENCE CONTRACT

The Ministry of Defence has extended its contract with lax Defence, adding 3,300 vehicles to the fleet of over 9,000 noncombat...

RCA 'PLODS' ON British Car Auctions (BCA) has agreed a

national contract with the National Association of Police Fleet Managers and the Police information Technology Organisation to...

Van for high-speed deliveries

II There's a new name on the commercial market with the launch of a five-model range of car-derived vans from MG Rover,...

Tricom monitor makes lorry loaders safer

• A British firm, Tricom (GB), has developed the Truck Safe warning system to address the safety issues recently highlighted...

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LICENCE WORMS The poor maintenance record of Peterhead-based William B

Davidson has resulted in his licence being suspended for a period of 14 days. Davidson, who trades as Davidson of Rora,...

SIONIFICANT ACTION

Shotts-based Wypers has been given a severe warning about its future conduct by the Scottish DTC Richard McFarlane following a...

IIMMIIIMMED SITE

Maintenance problems and the use of an unauthorised operating centre led to AAA 1st Olympic of Birmingham being given a formal...

DVBILOAD FINE

Overloading the first axle of a car transporter cost driver Barry Warner of Laceby £578.78 in fines and costs. Magistrates in...

'Sloppy operation' shows up paperwork inadequacy

A Cumbrian haulier who ran "an incredibly sloppy operation", and accidentally threw away his maintenance records, has had two...

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Hefty fine for illegal operation charges

a A host of charges relating to illegal operation have cost Ilford-based Flowstand. trading as Southern Freight Services,...

Annual test is not there to replace maintenance

A Northumberland haulier has been told not to use the annual test to discover L -I- 4 1:A faults with his vehicles as the...

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Campaign highlights dangers of fatigue

e by Steve Banner Hauliers must wake up to the dangers associated with driver tiredness, says Dr Paul Jackson of AWAKE, which...

TNT advice on health

111 Safety Is vitally important, but so is occupational health. That's the view of health, safety, and environmental director...

Useful contacts

• AWAKE works closely with the Sleep Research Centre. Dr Jackson can be contacted on 020 7693 6166 or 07813 943212. • Fatigue...

USE roll cage safety video

• Worries over the dangers presented by roil cages have prompted the HSE to look at ways of minimising the risks they pose....

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Call for sheeting regulations

• Quarry operators countrywide are redoubling their insistence that all tippers leaving their sites must have their loads...

Accidents during loading and unloading often occur because lighting is

poor, says Lab Craft. As a consequence, it has come up with FrigolIght. Designed for use it temperatures down to -25"C, It ci...

MIMS

New regulations to control fire ant explosion risks from dangerous substances and potentially explosi atmospheres have been...

IMOGEGLEAR A new on-board warning system thi tells drivers if

their truck is too tall to go under a low bridge has been introduced by Bridgeciear. It complements a unit Introduced last year...

New head predicts 'stricter enforcement'

I Transport companies can expect more rigorous enforcement of health and safety legislation by the USE over the next 12 months....

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NOT A CLUE

Tim Maughan's report "Scots fume at city tolls" (CM13-19 Feb) shows how little those who legislate for our industry really...

TOO LITTLE, TOO LATE?

It was wonderful to read in CM (13-19 Feb) that Simon Hughes and the Lib-Dems are now supporting CMs campaign on stowaways....

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TIME TO DECIDE

The correspondence columns of Commercial Motor and other trucking publications often contain whingeing letters from drivers...

It's your shout!

. Congestion charging has been in force in the capital for four days—how has it affected you, and do you agree with CM that the...

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Separated at birth: Part lif of a very occasional series Earl Attlee and David Irlam

It might just be us, but we'll be blowed if we can tell the difference between these two haulage high-fliers. Although one...

"I told you not to let the elk driver

But seriously, this little tableau proves that British drivers have it easy in the winter. it's a graphic reminder to Swedish...

Backfire would like to raise a glass to north Manchester

firm Geoffrey Reyner. or Reyners as it now seems to be known. It Is celebrating Its 50th anniversary by trying to raise &WACO...

We're all for accuracy here, and we welcome PR firms

sending us corrections to press releases; after all, we are falhble too (see right). That said, it's doubly welcome if the PR...

TIME TRAVELLER

Our anachronistic review in celebration of the universal law...what goes around, comes around. 75 years ago 21 February 1928...

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INI

Iveco needs to go back to school with the Daily to master the three Rs: reliability, reliability and reliability; even so, this...

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OPERATOR FEEDBACK

BISON

• Alan Clucas is operations director for Bison, a leader

in the construction industry with its design and manufacture of hollow pre-cast concrete floors used in retail, indus trial and...

"The driver likes the size of the vehicle but says it could do with a bit more

power" Carol Stratton Carol Stratton is deputy manager for Brent Plastics, a laminate distributor based in Willesden. London....

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"We bought the 6.5-tonne Iveco last June for its rear axle capacity and the

crew cab" Mick Wakefield Pi Mick Wakefield has run his vehicle recovery business in Boston for 25 years. Wakefield Recovery...

"Most operators using this size of vehicle will expect to keep it for four to five years"

Chris Wright is MD of Commercial Vehicle Auctions. CVA holds sales at Doncaster on two Wednesdays each month with a throughput...

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"Only Vario and Mascott come close to the lveco Daily 65 C15"

Most operators using this size of vehicle will expect to keep it for four to five years. There is nothing drastically wrong...

VERDICT

Every manufacturer has something to learn when it introduces a new model and, in this case, it is reliability. The 650[5 Daily...

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1 I you decide to buy your trucks, rather

than lease or rent them, then at some stage you'll have to work out how to dispose of them as second-hand vehicles. Your only...

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Preparing a truck for sale

Auction houses like CVA can make your truck look more appealing prior to the sale by giving it anything from a wash to a full...

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A t a time when most companies seem desperate to re-brand

themselves with a meaningless logo or name, its rather refreshing to find a large organisation still happy to be identified...

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PROFITS

Asked how much the company makes in proftts. Adams admits it is not enough. On last year's turnover of £22m, Taylors recorded a...

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RECENT& IMMINENT

% o r LEGISLATION The European Communities (Rights against Insurers) Regulations 2002, CIF 19 January 2003. These regulations...

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C ouncillor Andrew Burns, executive member for transport at Edinburgh City

Council, pulls no punches over the subject of congestion charging—and the fact that hauliers will not be excluded from it when...

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Partnerships are an ideal way for hauliers to cut running

costs or exploit a market niche without investing too heavily. But should the relationship be based on trust or does it really...

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THE ENE Sadly many companies fall victim to fraud by

trusted staff. So how can you cope when this happens to you? Clayton Ruthven reports. t couldn't happen here, my people are...

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Mike Ham, business development manager for Massey Wilcox Transport, explains

how he has jumped through hoops to apply for a rail-freight grant, only to hoar in the last few weeks that the government is...