$64,000 Question
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T1IS week's 64,000 dollar question: how naïve can a politician become? Speaking of the Govertunent's road programme, Mr. Harold Watkinson, Minister of Transport, said at Hendon last week: "When my predecessors in this Ministry—Mr. Alan Lennox-Boyd and Mr. John BoydCarpenter—announced the beginnings of this plan it should have been obvious that the Government intended to see it through. I am astonished that it is only now, when I go about the country starting actual road works, that motorists have the faith to believe tbat it is really going to happen."
It would be more astonishing if any person of normal intelligence believed in any Government promise until it was
Expensive Resolution
THE $100 question at the Goodyear factories at Wolver
hampton and Wallasey is: "Will you have a cigarette? Anyone who catches any of three Goodyear• executives—Mr. T. C. Wallace, Mr. C. J. Thomas and Mr. G. W. Johnson-smoking this year will be paid 100 American dollars by the guilty person. The other two virtuous parties will also receive $100 each. If any one of the trio discovers another smoking, the other two get $50 each.
These are the terms of a New Year pact.which they made to give up smoking. Moreover, the penalties will be incurred for every detected breach of the agreement throughout the year.
The "Square" quare”
THE well-known motoring correspondent of a national daily L newspaper reported last week that the new Austin Gipsy was " called the 4 x 4 because of its square box shape." The younger generation has a word for him.
Bright Ideas
I LIKE the slogan which appears on the back of an envelope I received the other day from the Department of Government Transport at Sydney, Australia, "Travel by Bus! No Parking Fuss.it runs. The front of the envelope is used to sell the department's private-hire facilities. State enterprise obviously need not be pedestrian.
Selling Haulage
PRIVATE enterprise in Australia is, however, not to be left I behind. Yellow Express Carriers, Ltd., of Melbourne and Sydney, publish a four-page monthly bulletin in two colours to keep customers in touch with their activities. Most of the space is occupied by large pictures illustrating the wide range of work done by Yellow Express, varying from parcels delivery to the haulage of abnormal indivisible loads.
Is there any private-enterprise haulier in Britain who publishes a house organ?
£450 Short TO have run the Scottish Commercial Vehicle Driver of the i Year Competition this year would have cost between 050 and f1,000, 'apart from the expense of sending one or two competitors to France to take part in the Continental championship. Certain associations had promised about £300 between them, but there was no hope of raising the balance. That is why, as The CoMmercial Motor reported last week, the competition has been suspended this year.
Meanwhile, a successor has to be found for Mr. John Hastie as -secretary, because, with his many other commitments, he is unable to carry on. So far there has been no rush for the position. The reluctance of individuals to take office has been matched by the general antipathy towards paying up.