NEW PHASE OF GLASGOW BUS DISPUTE.
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Court Actions to Settle a Difference Between the Corporation and Three Bus 'Companies.
ACTIONS now pending between the Lanarkshire Traction Co., the Scottish General Transport Co., Ltd., Midland Bus Services, Ltd., and Glasgow Corporation have lent a new phase to the protracted bus dispute in Glasgow. The larger companies are. apparently not prepared to accept, -without a determined fight, the monopoly powers re‘ cently acquired by Glasgow, and at the present moment considerable interest centres around the situation which has arisen as the result of an action of suspension and interdict against the Magistrates Committee of Glasgow.
The lead has been taken by the Lanarkshire Traction Co., which states that since 1924 it has run buses into the city and that for the first year or two it was not interfered with by the respondent and it ran its buses without any licence or certificate -from the magistrates of Glasgow.
In 1926, however, when the bus situa
tion in Glasgow became tense, the respondent required the complainer to apply for certificates for its buses used in the city as stage carriages within the meaning of the Glasgow Police Act. 1866. The Lanarkshire concern applied for, and was granted, licences for its buses, and from time to time thereafter applied for a renewal of these certificates, and for certificates for new buses which it had occasion to put into use.
In the licences issued to the company for buses plying between Larkhall and Glasgow, the corporation of Glasgow adjected conditions regarding the routes to be followed by these buses within the city boundaries to and from the bus stance at Cathedral Street, which had been appointed as the place of departure. The complainer objected to these conditions and was unable to obtain modifications and, therefore, decided to disregard them. The certificates in question would in the ordinary course have expired on May 13th, 1930, but, owing to the complaining company's action, they were cancelled on February 10th by the respondent.
The Lanarkshire undertaking, however, continued, it is stated, to run its buses from Hamilton to Glasgow, and on April 15th it was convicted in the Central Police Court on a complaint of having used one of its buses without a licence from the Glasgow magistrates.
By way of stated case the concern appealed against the conviction to the High Court of Justiciary. In the course of the hearing a contention submitted on behalf of the Lanarkshire Traction Co. that the adjection of the conditions to its certificate was ultra vires of the respondent body was withdrawn, on the suggestion of the court that it was inappropriate for determination in a summary process, and ought to be raised in a civil action by the complaining organization. The appeal was, therefore, dismissed.
The next step by the complainer was an application to the corporation for new certificates. At the licensing court the magistrates told the agent for the complainer that certificates would be granted only provided the conditions as to routes were complied with, but as the agent refused on behalf of the Lanarkshire concern to comply with these eon
ditions the application for new certificates was refused.
The complainer has now raised an action in the Court of Session against the respondent body for the purpose of having its rights in relation to running buses in the city of Glasgow, with or without certificates, judicially ascertained.
Similar questions under the general law are raised in other actions of suspension and interdict which have been lodged against the same authority by the Scottish General Transport, Ltd., and the Midland Bus Services, Ltd. The issue is awaited by all the private bus concerns with considerable interest, because upon the decision will be decided the extent of the monopoly powers of Glasgow in respect of private bus companies operating within the city boundaries.