Our trucks didn't deserve loyalty
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MIKE DAVIES (CM letters 13 September) may have "spent all his working life involved with two British truck manufacturers" but as he said in his letter, he wasn't a professional driver and it shows.
He bemoans "European rivals some with their pricing heavily subsidised by their taxpayers-, but British Leyland (Leyland, Morris, Guy,Austin, etc) was a fully nationalised industry.
British trucks didn't get loyalty because they didn't deserve it. If the choice was between a Leyland Marathon or a Volvo F88 both operator and driver voted with their feet.
What evidence has he to say British products would have "...matched if not surpassed our foreign competitors"? The only truck to come close from the perspective of a driver living in it for any length of time was the Ford Transcontinental, which had a French-designed cab...
On the plus side British makers did provide plenty of wagons to take to rallies 30 years later and wax nostalgic over.
Dave Young London