Trunk Road Services Must Run
Page 16
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The Country's Road Tr-ansport Needs Must Not be Subservient to Politically Powerful Opponents
WE learn, on good authority, that further representations to the Minister of Transport, urging that there is a serious and substantial need for the continuation of many of the trunk services, were met with an uncompromising negative. Apparently. the Minister has dug in his toes and refuses to budge. Neither reason nor argument will move him. That will not do. Even if our report of what transpired be a little exaggerated, even if the attitude with which the deputation was met was not quite so intransigent ai we have been led to believe, we still say that it will not do. To give but scant recognition of the services which road transport renders is deplorable in peace time ; in war it may become a tragedy.
It is quite clear that the Minister, even now, has entirely failed to grasp the very essential fact that road transport in 1939 is absolutely .essential to the efficient distribution of foodstuffs and other essentials, in war as much as in peace. . It would be extremely hazardous, even in time of peace, suddenly to dislocate the intricate, complicated and delicate mechanism of the means for distribution; in time of war it is positively dangerous to attempt to do so. Indeed, the detrimental results of such dislocation had already become apparent before rationing commenced, as the result of the diversion of vehicles from commercial use to military and allied purposes. Shortage of this, that or the other variety of foodstuffs experienced in various localities has, time and again, been referred to in Ministry of Information broadcasts, with the assurance ( ?) that it is due to difficulties of transport and not to actual dearth.
Effects of 1933 Act Now Clear.
This state of affairs is the natural and, by knowledgeable transport authorities, long-foreseen effect of the strangulation of road-transport operations by the 1933 Act. That subject was dealt with by us in a leading article in our issue of September 1. The effect is more noticeable to-day than it was as recently as then. Road hauliers, stringently limited by the Act to equipment barely sufficient for their normal needs, now, as to all but a small minority of them, find their fleets reduced in number by 75 or 80 per cent., and in capacity and efficiency more even than that, for only the best are taken and the older left. This is the result of sequestration by military and other bodies which have the right to commandeer vehicles. The restriction imposed as the effect of petrol rationing still further complicates the situation. Hauliers are at their wits' end to deal with the essential traffics which they are being asked to handle, and none has any confidence in ordering new vehicles, since it is firmly believed throughout the trade that new vehicles will be impressed. It must not be thought that we are unaware of, or indifferent to, the need for conservation of fuel. We are fully aware of the fact that "there is a war on." Moreover, whilst we insist that the purpose and first duty of this journal, in peace and even more in war, is to watch the interests of road transport, we fully endorse the view that this is a time when none should be for the party but all for the State.
What we do believe is that, in upholding the rights of our readers, we are in this instance acting for the benefit of the country. We believe that those who have been appointed by the State to deal with this matter of transport are woefully ignorant of the real facts and necessities of the case. We are joining, therefore, with those leading spirits in the industry, those who have been so abruptly repulsed in their endeavours to help authority, in putting forward the true facts.
Group Organizers Not Encouraged.
Even in respect of local road haulage, the need for which is grudgingly granted, the hard-working and entirely unpaid haulier members of group organizations are not being given all the assistance to which they are justly entitled. Some progress is, nevertheless, being made in that department of transport, despite these handicaps.
What we maintain is, that if long-distance transport were to be discussed and treated in the same manner there need be no suggestion that it should be more than a little curtailed. It is not, however, a provincial matter, but one which must be dealt with in London by negotiation with those who are at the head of things, both in transport organization and in Government circles. The complaint we, and interested parties, have to make is that there is no attempt being made to consider the subject properly in the light of present-day requirements. Those in authority are still thinking in terms of 1914-1918; they are, in brief, 25 years behind the times in their appreciation of the actualities of transport as a whole. They cannot, or will not, realize that the railways could not deal with all the traffic which passes even in normal conditions, and that they are quite inadequate for the purpose in war.
The plain truth of the matter is that long-distance transport by road is an integral part of transport as a whole. To ask the country to do without it is like asking a man to fight with one arm tied. We join the leaders of the industry in demanding, with complete justification for doing so, that the Minister shall either withdraw the ban on long-distance road transport or, failing that, justify his attitude in the face of the facts and figures which we have already put before him, facts and figures which show that the ban is both unnecessary and impracticable.