Finance company has called back 40 vehicles, Sammy Davis tells LA
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• The public inquiry into the application by Larrow Transport (Northern) Ltd. to acquire A licences previously operated by the liquidated members of the Davis Bros. group was resumed in London on Wednesday, it followed a two-day hearing adjourned on October 25 (CM November 1).
After en hour's delay at the start of the hearing due to the sorting out of documents, Mr. M. Davies, QC, for Larrow, submitted certain papers to the LA, Mr. b. I. R. Muir. These consisted of the certified accounts for the group companies for the year ended December 30 1966 and an account of the lending and borrowing between group companies.
The valuation of the Brentwood property once belonging to Davis Bros. was "on its way", said Mr. Davies, and a list would later be supplied of customers for whom work had once been done by Davis Bros. companies and later by Larrow.
Details of the amount of work done by Larrow within its normal user were furnished and the complete list of Larrow customers, the dates of their first becoming customers, types of goods carried and the area in which they were carried was also produced.
Mr. Davies agreed that on the evidence now collected "a substantial amount" of traffic now being carried by Larrow did not fall within the normal user granted in the Northern traffic area.
Mr. R. M. Yorke, for the THC, had received the account of inter-company lending and borrowing only that morning and pointed out that the document purporting to be a consolidated statement of affairs as at December 30 1966 included among yearly accounts details relating to Buckfast Properties Ltd., a Davis Bros. company covering the period not to December 30 but to March 31 1967—one of 15 months. As it was also in manuscript and uncertified, it could not be included in iomething purporting to be a certified account, Mr. Muir complained that the documents were difficult to read, having been poorly photocopied, and that the accounts, although supposedly certified, were not signed. Mr. Davies apologized for the difficulties arising over the documents and assured the L,A that it was the best he could do in the circumstances. Mr. Yorke, however, said he would submit that the fact that • these undertakings had not been kept reflected upon the applicant's lack of fitness to receive a grant.
Three letters of support from past and would-be future customers were produced and three representatives from companies supporting the application gave .evidence.
Mr. Sammy Davis, continuing his evidence, told the LA that since the adjournment 40 vehicles had been either seized, returned to or had been promised to be returned to Forward Trust Ltd., from whom they Were being bought on hire purchase. The application would therefore be amended to take this into account.
In March 1967, said Mr. Davis, the group companies balanced out their debts to each other and a letter to this effect dated March 7 1967 from the group's accountant to the Anglo-Israel Bank Ltd. was produced.
In cross-examination, Mr. Yorke said that it was the THC's contention that Charles Poulter Ltd., although claimed to be owned solely by Mr. Solly Davis, was in fact a part of the Davis Bros. group. If this were not so, he asked Mr. Davis to explain why the company had been included in the letter to the bank setting out the repayment ofloans between companies within the Davis Bros. group. Mr. Davis denied this and said that it was his accountant and not himself who had arranged the repayment and drafted the letter.
Mr. Yorke reminded Mr: Davis that at the adjourned hearing he (Mr. Yorke) had said that if all relevant accounts explaining borrowing and repayment by inclividUal , directors were not produced, he would make the submission that the directors had been "milking the companies at the expense of the creditors". There had been no accounts submitted for Davis Bros. (Trailers') Ltd., and those for Buckfast Properties, were not for the desired period.
There were discrepancies' totalling some £81,000 in the figures given for the value of motor vehicles owned by individual companies, claimed Mr. Yorke. Theonly explanation for thit, his &intended, was that either the accounts submitted were incorrect or that accounts for all companies had not been produced.
The hearing continued.