§ 3.40 p.m.
§ VISCOUNT LONGMy Lords, I beg to ask the Question which stands in my name on the Order Paper.
§ [The Question was as follows:
§ To ask His Majesty's Government what was the total profit made from road haulage during the past year, and how much of this profit has been made from general road haulage under the Road Haulage Executive.]
453§ LORD LUCAS OF CHILWORTHMy Lords, if in the first part of the Question the noble Viscount is referring to the profit made from road haulage in the country generally, the information re-quested is not available and could not be obtained. As to the second part, if the noble Viscount is referring to the net traffic receipts for road haulage by British Road Services, the accounts of the British Transport Commission for 1949 (Schedule IV-I, on page 184A) show these to be £1,431,721. If by "profit" the noble Viscount means the net revenue after de-ducting a proportion of central charges, the Commission, for the reasons given in paragraph 54 of their Report, do not consider it practicable to allocate these charges to individual activities.