Costs Awarded in Brake Case
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T Bridgend magistrates' court last r-v week a charge brought against
Western Welsh Omnibus Co., Ltd., of permitting a bus with inefficient brakes to be used was dismissed and 25 guineas costs were awarded to the defendant.
The prosecution stated that the vehicle in question, a double-decker, had been involved in an accident. When the brakes were tested after the accident, it was alleged that the hand brake was inefficient, A police sergeant stated in evidence that the efficiency figure returned by the hand brake when tested by a meter was below the figure demanded by the Ministry of Transport. This view was supported by a vehicle examiner, who declared that an efficiency figure of 30 per cent. was called for in the Ministry of Transport regulations.
For the defence it was held that because the brake-testing meter had been set on a gradient, the reading returned when the hand brake was applied was inaccurate. Furthermore, no fixed figure was laid down by the law concerning hand-brake efficiency. The magistrates concluded that the police had not established a case and dismissed the summons.
The driver of the bus was found not guilty of driving a public-service vehicle with. inefficient brakes, but was fined £2, with £3 2s. 10d. costs, for driving without due care and attention.
TRANSPORT A TEST CASE,. SAY LIBERALS
STEEL and ,transport, said Mr. Philip Fothergill, chairman of the Liberal Party Executive, last week, were test cases of the highest importance. It was vital that the Government proposals should carry the strongest intellectual conviction. They should be just And should establish the principle of free enterprise and disarm the faintest suspicion of shady deals with, vested interests.
If these Wks were applied, he Said, the Government was highly vulnerable on transport. The Government needed to think hard on the transport question and to think in more simple terms. For considerations of party expediency and national interest, it should debate steel before transport in the next Parliamentary session.
NO NEW AGREEMENT WITH B.M.M.O.
APROPOSAL to make a new agreement with the Birmingham and Midland Motor Omnibus Co., Ltd., was rejected by Worcester City Council, last week. Ald. C. H. Built bad urged that payment to the company of £705, to cover losses on running services in the city during June and July, should not be made until a conference on amending the 1928 agreement had been held.
The council agreed to pay the sum_ In the past 18 months it has paid the B.M.M.O. nearly £6,000.