Garner 'Normal User' Appeal Rejected
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THE Transport Tribunal, in London on Wednesday, dismissed an appeal by R. Garner Ltd. of Farnworth, Lancashire, against a decision of the North Western deputy Licensing Authority.
The Tribunal president, Mr. G. D. Squibb, said the company had carried on business as A-licensed hauliers since 1948, with a declared normal user of " Textiles, dye stuffs, provisions and general goods. in Yorkshire, Lancashire, Derbyshire and Cheshire, and as required ".
Garner had been taken over by another firm in 1962 and an application for a renewal of the A licence was made in January, 1963, with the same declaration of normal user.
When the application came before the deputy Authority, said Mr. Squibb, he had come to the conclusion that the work the company was doing was really Wallpaper, steel pipes, constructional steel, electrical goods, concrete products and lubricating oil, England and Scotland". He had invited the company to declare this but Garner refused and came to appeal.
Mr, J. Main, for the company, had rightly staled that the declaration was a matter solely for the applicant Mr. J. Main, for the appellant, asked during the appeal for a declaration of " General goods, England and Scotland ". Mr. Squibb said it semed to the Tribunal that .the application, in that form, was misleading and not calculated to bring the realities of the application to the notice of potential objectors. In their view, he said, it would not be right to grant the licence that declaration, made at the eleventh hour.
For the respondent—the British Railways Board—Mr. A. J. F. Wrottesley suggested that putting the words "general goods" at the end of a list of commodities in the user must mean that the general operations of the fleet were small compared with the other goods. General operations in that case meant lesser operations, •he submitted. The goods to be carried did not relate to the old normal user, and the customers were not the same, Mr. Wrottesley continued.
The Tribunal allowed Garner 21 days to apply for a short-term licence, pending a further application with a "more realistic declaration of normal user".