The answer to the riddle will come as shock to licensed taxi drivers, who were expecting a large boost to their business in shopping centre and railway station car parks, and no doubt will be the subject of many conversations with their passengers in the next few weeks. The cabbies were hoping that a decision by the High Court on 29 November in the case of Clarke v Kato would redefine privately owned shopping centre and railway station car parks as "public highways" allowing them to "ply for trade" - pick up passengers - without having to pay a fee for the privilege of waiting in a designated taxi rank.In addition, the cabbies were hoping that minicabs would be prevented from waiting in the same ranks (for which they also have to pay a fee to the car park owners) because the minicabs are prevented by their unlicensed status from plying for trade on anything that is defined as a public highway.An article in the Cab Driver newspaper claimed that the decision "means that minicabs can no longer wait in the car parks of shops, large shopping centres or places of public entertainment". It was a decision "which the UK licensed taxi trade could hardly of [sic] dreamed about".Sadly for the cabbies, it is not to be. Instead, the ruling defined a private car park that had frequent pedestrian traffic across it as a "road" for the purposes of the Roads Act 1988. This meant, among other things, that motor insurance policies were valid.A spokeswoman for the Department of Transport explained that roads and public highways are very different creatures."A road is simply a way of getting from A to B, and can be public or privately owned," she said. "A public highway, on the other hand, is one that is maintained at public expense and to which there is general access."She added that the definition also applied to cars that did not display a road tax disc: in a car park or other private road no tax disc is required; however, the lack of a displayed tax disc on a public highway results in a fine. The question of whether motor insurance was valid on such "roads" had now been cleared up, she said.Cabbies, who have been campaigning against the high fees levied on them by privatised managements of railway stations to stand in their taxi ranks, and against the equal status of private minicabs on those ranks, said they would continue to press for free access to what they saw as "public road".
"I don't pay thousands of pounds to buy and run my black cab to the Public Carriage Office's standards so that I can be undercut by minicabs and charged yet more money by car park owners," said one cabbie.At least one large minicab firm was monitoring developments. "It would appear this was yet another attempt by the licensed cab trade to push us out of bona fide business, and I'm glad to learn that the High Court decision is not going to affect us in the way they hoped," said the firm's owner.. The European Commission will step to the aid of the armchair sports fan this week with plans to curb the growing power of cable and satellite TV firms such as BSkyB in snapping up important live sports events. The proposals, to be discussed in Brussels on Wednesday, will ensure that viewers across Europe will not be charged to view prestige national sporting events. "The objective is to ensure that events of major importance for society are on clear (non-encrypted) television and not on pay television," a Commission official said this weekend.The move comes after BSkyB strengthened its pivotal position in the UK television industry on Friday, in a deal with Granada and Carlton to bid for a new digital terrestrial TV licence.The firm, 40 per cent owned by Rupert Murdoch's News Corp, is already planning to launch up to 200 digital channels on satellite later this year and will this week authorise a pounds 250m order for set-top decoders.BSkyB's success will also be underlined by a 25 per cent rise in first- half profits to at least pounds 132m on Wednesday from pounds 106m last time. Just four years ago it was still loss-making.Along with the new British Digital Broadcasting (BDB) joint venture, BSkyB has already linked up with Germany's powerful Kirch Group in Europe, with more deals likely.Industry sources say that Carlton was set to take 51 per cent of BDB, but in the end Sky's muscle secured it a one-third share, not the 24.5 per cent originally proposed.At present, only three of the European Union's 15 member states - the UK, France and Belgium - protect viewers' rights to watch big sports events free of charge.A defeat in the House of Lords last March saved the "crown jewels" - the FA Cup and Scottish FA Cup finals, the Derby, Grand National, Wimbledon finals, the football World Cup, Olympic Games and England's home cricket tests - from Sky's clutches after a government U-turn.In France, European Cup football, Five Nations rugby, the cup final, Olympics and Tour de France are similarly protected, while Belgium's Flemish region draws up a new list each year.Next week, however, the Commission is likely to endorse plans to set those rights in stone across the European Union.Under the proposals, broadcasters like BSkyB, Canal+ in France and Silvio Berlusconi's Mediaset in Italy would still be able to buy exclusive rights. But they would have to make arrangements for viewers to watch for free. "The rules concern not the acquisition but the use of rights," the Commission official said.Shares in Pace Micro Technology are expected to be among the biggest gainers when the order for 1 million set-top boxes is made after BSkyB's board meeting on Tuesday.The West Yorkshire firm is understood to be one of four manufacturers lined up, including Nokia, Sony and Panasonic..
My search for memorable advertisements was exceptionally fruitful. They range from the famous - such as the Shell ad here reproduced - to the tantalisingly obscure. Norman Singleton remembers this from the Twenties, on a tea container: "Oh look at this picture of housewives to be/ The future consumers of Hornimans tea". And: "Take Iron Jelloids now and then/The tonic for women, the tonic for men (and children)". William Mason, whose memory also goes back a long way, offers: "If you want to get ahead, get a hat!" (Dunn & Co); "Where's George? He's gone to Lyons" (J Lyons tea shops); "Friday night is Amami night" (Amami shampoo); "Sharp's the word: Sharp's the toffee"; "Out of the blue comes the whitest wash!" (Reckitt's Blue Bag); "Murray mints, Murray mints, the too-good-to-hurry-mints!" The History of Advertising Trust has sent me an ad that goes with this last: it has a sergeant major shouting "That man there!" at a contented guardsman who says: "I'm finishing my Murray mint!"From Adrian Brodkin: "Triumph has the bra for the way you are"; "Which twin has the Toni?" (Toni was a home perm); and "Phyllosan fortifies the over-forties". D M Hill offers: "He seems to know there's thyamine in it (for a cat food); and "Settlers give express relief". James Dixon: "Benzine makes you go ..." (national petrol company in the Fifties) Mr Dixon says. "This memory usually occurs to me when I am stuck in a traffic jam and getting desperate to go to a public convenience."Bill Fowler says that when Surprise flash-frozen peas came on the market an old country type said: "I'm just going into the garden for a surprise pea." Bit raffish for the Fifties, that.Shawn Pullman and others offer: "Hoarse? Go suck a Zube", while Chris Sladen has alarmingly clear recall of this: "Barons, Barons, the cigarette for you/Barons, Barons, the cigarette for you/ They've got the fullest flavour/And they're a money saver/Barons, Barons, the cigarette for you." I suggest this should be submitted as our next entry in the Eurovision Song Contest.I have received a press notice with the following headline: "IBM introduces the first network-enabled global human resources solution." This is splendid: if IBM has found a global human resources solution, it must have found an answer to hunger, poverty, etc And if it is network-enabled, jolly good ...
I wonder if it knows what it is talking about.British was bestBack to ads. Michael Cudlipp, who runs the History of Advertising Trust, cleared up the mystery of the "I'm backing Britain". Those of a certain age will remember this as being a popular patriotic campaign, when such things were still allowed. All I remember is sticking union jacks over the car windows, presumably to the delight of my parents.I assumed it was stirred up by the papers. In fact, Mr Cudlipp tells me, it was a business campaign, set up by that splendid organisation the Industrial Society. Harold Wilson triggered it by saying, wittily, that "what we want is back Britain, not backbiting".
The Society launched the campaign in January, 1968 and it gained great momentum before fizzling out in August. It even generated a rival campaign called the Help Britain Group. This failed, which was strange because it was run by a Labour MP with a remarkable talent for promotion - Robert Maxwell.Do you think a new condition called Phone User's Elbow will emerge? Or will chronic mobile phone users just find their arms seize up with their hands near their ears - like the unfortunates caught by the lava in Pompeii?I saw four people sitting round a table in the Bunhill Towers shopping centre, each on a mobile phone I wonder if they were talking to each other?. Wired-up clients of the Royal Bank of Scotland were delighted to learn 10 days ago that they can now run their accounts through the Internet. By dialling into the World Wide Web on their computers, they are now able to move money around, check a balance or pay standing orders.