MIXING OF GOODS LEADS SWITCH REQUEST TO
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r'IVE reasons were given by Meeting I Motors Ltd., of High Wycombe, Bucks, for an application, heard last week by the Metropolitan deputy Licensing Authority, Mr. C. J. Macdonald, to convert eight furniture vans from• Contract A to open A licence. British Road. Services, British Railways and several independent hauliers objected, and the application was adjourned to a date to be fixed.
For Meeting Motors, Mr, M. H. Jackson-Lipkin said that the conversion was necessary because there had been a " mixing of goods" belonging to subsidiary companies with those of the two contract customers for whom the vehicles worked. There had been a startling increase in the business of the major customers, he said; vehicles had had to make long journeys with multiple drops; r and there were difficulties over maintenance, breakdowns and sub-contracting.
Mr. W. H. Meeting, managing director of the applicant company, said that because of the rapid expansion in production of Fir View Furniture Co. Ltd., for whom he operated seven contract vehicles, his company could not cope with the traffic. An additional applicationhad already been submitted for a further four vehicles.
Supporting evidence was given by Mr. E. J. Rickson, chairman of Fir View Furniture Co. Ltd., Hughertden Furniture Ltd. (for whom the applicants operated one vehicle on contract), and J. W. Bates and Son, a subsidiary company of Hughenden.
Goods belonging to any one of the three companies had been loaded on to the contract vehicles, Mr. Rickson said. There had been a 50 per cent increase of n4 production over last year, which had led to chaos at Fir View. Twenty-two loads were waiting at the factory at the moment, he continued, and on two occasions the production line had had to be stopped because of tack of transport.
Asked what he would do if Meeting Motors were not allowed extra transport flexibility, Mr. Rickson said that he would have to purchase at least 10 lorries and "go into C-licence work ". He told the deputy L.A. that he would ask for no further Contract A vehicles until after the hearing of the second application.
Before the application was adjourned, Mr. Jackson-Lipkin urged the deputy L.A. not to prosecute his clients for the carriage of goods in the wrong vehicles.