Mr. De la Bèreasked the Minister of War Transport whether he will give an assurance that retailers now have adequate petrol allowance to enable them to make the necessary deliveries in the rural 282W areas, in view of the difficulties of motor omnibus transport and the many hours which rural residents have to spend in waiting for transport and standing in food queues.
§ Mr. BarnesFor the past four months motor fuel has been available to enable any retailer to deliver groceries once weekly, or meat, fish or greengroceries, twice weekly. I have recently decided to remove even these restrictions, and fuel will, in future, be available for any reasonable retail deliveries. I must, however, warn the hon. Member that retailers have hitherto found it difficult, in many cases, to make use of the fuel already available to them owing to shortage of labour.