Lancashire - Co-ordinate

Series

Series Name

Mining Review 21st Year

Issue

Issue No.

8

Date Released

Apr 1968

Stories in this Issue:

1. 1National Preview - Eggheads Only
2. 2Lancashire - Co-ordinate
3. 3Nottinghamshire - Coal Grown
4. 4Ripping

Story

Story No. within this Issue

2 / 4

Summary

NoS synopsis: Rochdale, Lancashire, pioneers a new form of centralised solid fuel distribution
NCB Commentary - An emergency call - not to put a fire out, but to keep one in. At Rochdale’s new Solid Fuel Centre, the phone is manned day and night.
When the staff goes home a robot is this little box takes over.
And in the morning, when the staff comes in, the telephonist presses a button and a tape spins back. Another button - and the queries and orders come out - for action.
This is no ordinary Solid Fuel Centre - it’s unique, the first to combine the Coal Board’s Sales office with those of the local, private coal Merchants.
Whoever’s your dealer, you can order, and pay at the one place.
All the latest appliances are on view, and the range of budget central heating schemes. Your order is passed on to one of the local dealers.
All of them are on a roster - the distribution of the orders is fair and can be seen to be fair. The books are open for inspection and every dealer can check that he is getting his share of the business.
It all began with the Report of the Prices and Incomes Board on the retail coal trade.
A rationalisation committee was formed by the Coal Board and the local merchants and for the first time rivals in the trade met together to work out a scheme.
In Rochdale, as elsewhere, the old is being torn down - new houses and shopping centres are going up.
To keep pace with these changes, the coal trade too decided to bring itself up to date.
Wilf Lea, the Coal Board’s local sales manager, visited his opposite numbers in the private firms.
Researches checked and analysed the problems.
Then the committee met again - to study the map, to work out delivery routes, and to plan the location of storage depots.
In the past, 218 grades of coal flowed into Rochdale form 169 pits. One of the first steps was to reduce the number of suppliers to just 16 collieries.
In the past, there were depots, big and small, all over the area. Delivery trucks criss-crossed the region, wasting time and fuel.
Now, new depots are being built, so that no truck will have to travel more than 4 miles.
This centre, serving the needs of nearly 150,000 people, is just the tip of the ice-berg. For it demonstrates how new ways of thinking, co-operation between Coal Board and more than a hundred Coal Retailers can help to keep down the cost of going home to a living fire.

Keywords

Fuels

Locations

England; Lancashire; Rochdale

Written sources

British Film Institute Databases
Films on Coal Catalogue   1969, p.55
The National Archives COAL 32   /13 Scripts for Mining Review, 1960-1963

Credits:

Sponsor

National Coal Board

Production Co.

National Coal Board Film Unit