NVestern L.A. Publishes Contract Applications
Page 29
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— and raises some technical points
AS mentioned in last week's issue, a recent edition of the Western Area's "Applications and Decisions" contains, in Part 1, two applications by a Devon haulier for Contract A licences in respect of vehicles to carry goods for two named customers. This, I understand, is the first time that Contract A licence applications, as such, have appeared in Part 1 of the Western "A's and D's", and their publication raises some fine technical points. Is a Contract A licence a notifiable application within the meaning of the Act; can other licence holders object to the applications?
There are two completely opposed .chools of thought on this question. They :entre purely and simply around the nterpretation of the word " trivial" Nhich appears in section 173 (I)(b) of be 1960 Act. Certain people practising n the licensing courts, and some officials it the Ministry of Transport, say that liontract A licences are not " notifiable 7, n view of section 174(2) of the Act. [This states that "the Licensing Authority ihail be obliged to grant the application 'unless he is satisfied that, having regard o the previous conduct of the applicant
n the capacity of a carrier of goods, he s not a fit person to receive a carrier's icence. in which case the Licensing ekuthority shall refuse the application)".
They say, further, that Contract A epplications cannot be objected to.
But there is another viewpoint, which [las many times been put by some of the Larger haulage companies and is championed by British Railways. These say :hat any application to put additional vehicles on the road cannot be " trivial", end in this they would appear to be Isacked up by the Transport Tribunal in
the John Ltd. appeal (the B.T.C. G. S. fohn Ltd.. Traffic Cases 31 part 9) which
said that a Contract A licence is not
an application which. the Licensing Authority is bound to grant. Such an application is therefore notifiable and must be published unless the Licensing Authority thinks it trivial".
It is a lamentable fact that Licensing Authorities in most cases automatically grant Contract A licences without publication, provided they are supplied with a copy of the contract and are satisfied that it is genuine. Thus potential objectors have no opportunity of knowing about the matter until the grant is published in Part III of 4.s. and Ds.
By publishing the two applications in the Western area booklet, the Licensing Authority is deliberately drawing the attention of other operators to the applications. It will he interesting to see if anyone objects. If they do, the matter is bound to come to a public hearing when, no doubt, it will be argued for the applicants that the Authority is bound to grant the applications which, in any case, are not notifiable, etc., etc. The John appeal decision will no doubt be thrown into the fray. and the Authority will have to decide whether the precedent he has now set of publishing Contract A licence applications iii Part I of As and Ds will have to be followed in the future.