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15th May 1959, Page 80
15th May 1959
Page 80
Page 80, 15th May 1959 — Dead Horse
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Which of the following most accurately describes the problem?

Political Commentary By JANUS

• T RUE to form, the Transport Tribunal had something unexpected up their sleeve for the written judgment in the George Allinson case. They had no difficulty in demolishing the forlorn defence put up against impossible odds by the legal representative of the appellants, but it was surprising that they should conclude with one suggestion to the Minister of Transport, and another to Licensing Authorities, for tightening the procedure that has to be followed in order to get a licence.

The Tribunal recommended that the Minister should amend the regulations so as to prescribe the form of licence and to require that it should give the unladen weight of every specified vehicle. The recommendation to Authorities was that in every case where the unladen weight is a material fact they should require it to be authenticated by the production certificate issued by an approved weighbridge. These amendments would make it more difficult than before for an operator to carry out what Mr. Allinson's representative called a "legitimate manoeuvre," but what the Tribunal preferred to describe as a "deliberate fraud." They would also add toa-the paper work required from an operator with no wish to present anything other than a straightforward application. The other; type of operator, if he cares to look for it, can usually find a loop hole in the law, however tightly framed. . .

What is unexpected about the suggestions from the Tribunal is that the George Allinson case was concerned with a special A licence, a feature of rapidly diminishing importance in the road haulage industry. Each special A licence was given a currency of five years. Many of them have already expired, others have been traded in for ordinary .A licences. Within a couple of years or so, the special A licence will be of, historical interest only. If the procedure is altered on the lines proposed by the Tribunal, the changes, at any rate insofar as they involve amending regulations, will take effect at almost the same time as the circumstances that made them necessary cease to apply.

Report Exaggerated?

The Tribunal noted with surprise a report that the question raised in the George Allinson case was "of great importance to a large number of hauliers." Whether the report was exaggerated or not, it is reasonably certain that the hauliers are all holders of special A licences, that the case had no parallel before the passing of the Transport Act, 1953, and that the question will have no relevance after the last special A licence has expired.

The special A licence is what the geneticists would call a sport, quite different in many ways from its near relations. The ordinary A or B licence has no value to which a figure can be attached. It cannot be bought or sold, transferred or assigned. To make sense of transactions where apparently just this is done, one must assume that the operator offering a haulage business for sale has built up goodwill, which somebody else is prepared to buy, together with the vehicles and possibly other property. All the same, the tangible and intangible assets are useless without the licence, and the buyer must ask the Licensing Authority for one, which he usually has no difficulty in setting if he is proposing to carry on the business much as before. The A licence is like the artist's signature, which adds nothing to the intrinsic value of a painting, but means everything so far as the market price is concerned.

Strictly speaking. it may be equally inappropriate to talk 1346 of buying a special A licence. Purchase of a transport unit under the 1953 Act meant the acquisition of vehicles and sometimes of other property, plus the opportunity to engage in road haulage. This opportunity was not the same as goodwill. British Road Services remained in business and kept as much goodwill as they could. They retained as far as possible addresses and telephone numbers to which customers had become accustomed. In addition, they were given the proceeds of the Transport Levy, which was supposed to compensate them., for loss of goodwill. They were able to have their cake and to eat it too.

The commonsense conclusion is that, if there were no transfer of goodwill, what the purchaser of a transport unit paid for over and above the value of the vehicles was the privilege of holding a special A licence. The law need have no regard for commonsense, and the legal conclusion may be different. The purchaser bid and paid a price that neither he nor the disposal board nor B.R.S.'split up. He has a strong case for claiming,. as he does when capital allowances are in question, that he bought the tangible assets only, and that the special A licence was granted to him in the same way as he may have received an ordinary A or B licence in respect of "claimed tonnage " after the passing of the Road and Rail Traffic Act, 1933.

Proof in His Eyes

Whatever the legal position, the purchaser acts as though he had bought his special A licence. He•would not otherwise have paid, for .example, 12,000 for a vehicle worth only half that amount. He believes he has acquired a piece of property for development. The proof f in his eyes is that, like any, other piece of 'property and unlike the ordinary A or B licence, his new acquisition can be sold to somebody else, and where appropriate it can be divided up and sold to several purchasers. He can get a price for the special A licence quite distinct from the vehicle or vehicles that go with it, and irrespective of whether or not he has any goodwill to offer. , .

This has been the point of entry for the dealer. He has been in the picture of disposal ever since the process began. He has new vehicles to sell, and if he can offer special A licences with them so much the better. The vehicle already attached to the licence can be sold used or as scrap—and many of the vehicles in transport units were fit only for that—and a new vehicle can take its place.

The main difficulty arises when the new vehicle has an unladen weight greater than that shown on the licence. Paragraph 6 of the first schedule of the 1953 Act is both clear and discouraging. The only variation of a special A licence that it permits is the removal of a specified vehicle or the substitution of a vehicle "of the same or less weight unladen." It was in an attempt to get round this obstacle that K. and B. Motors, Ltd., and Mr. Allinson embarked on the complicated course of action so destructively analysed in the judgment of the Tribunal.

The 1953 Act was designed to set in motion a course of events different from what actually followed. It was hoped, among other things, that far more ex-operators would come back into the industry andthat they would be offered something approximating to the businesses they had lost. It may not have been envisaged that special A licences would change hands so many times, or that so many would fall into the hands of dealers. As the effects of the Act wear off, so may the need for the extra licensing procedure that the Tribunal suggest.

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