• In what really amounted to wrapping a bit of
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tin and plastic round the engine and buying a load of proprietary parts that could well have come off the shelves of the lorry equivalent of Halfords, Steyr trucks have managed to drown out the vocal protests of the good burghers of Austria's Brenner Pass.
Some other manufacturers have cried "foul" at this new move by the Austrian government, as unlike themselves Steyr seems so well-equipped to provide low-noise trucks to comply with the forthcoming regulations.
Steyr, of course, is at pains to point out that it does not have close links with the Austrian lawmakers, and that it is merely far-sighted, and concerned for the well being of its countrymen.
This is doubtless true, but the demonstrations of its new low-noise trucks did little to prove it. While the trucks were driving up the Brenner Pass and being carefully measured for their noise outputs, the police had carefully blocked the bottom of the busy motorway to give Austria's largest company exclusive use of it for its own promotion.
The volume of traffic built up at the bottom of the pass while the demonstration went on, and there was a considerable traffic jam when it was finally reopened.
Try explaining to the Northamptonshire Police Force that you need exclusive use of the M1 to prove your products and gain valuable exports for Britain. . . go on, I dare you.