Justices rule free bingo service legal
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WREXHAM MAGISTRATES have thrown out a case against a coach operator who ran a free service to and from a bingo club.
Theophillis Roberts of Vale of Llangollen was accused of abstracting passengers from the regular bus service when he operated the service every Wednesday under contract to Rank Leisure Ltd, the club's owner. The passengers travelled free.
The police referred to the Westminster Coaches v Piddlesden case in 1932 when the divisional court decided that separate fares were being charged, although the passengers who were travelling to and from a greyhound stadium travelled free.
The manager of the bingo club said no tickets were issued on the service. Once the coach was full it left regardless of whether it was carrying the same people on the return journey as had travelled outwards. Regular passengers said that on average there were 54 passengers and sometimes those who travelled on the outward journey were left behind on the return journey as the coach went as soon as it was full.
Defending, John Backhouse argued that it could be distinguished from the 1932 case where tickets were issued to the passengers who, when they presented them at the entrance to the stadium, were given a ticket for the return journey.
He said that under the Road Traffic Act, 1966, a fare was paid in consideration of giving a person a right to be carried. In this case no one had any right to be carried and there was no contract existing between the passengers and the operator.
Even if it was held that the passengers were being carried at separate fares, the firm held a licence for excursions to Wrexham which authorised the picking-up points concerned, and if a road service licence was required that licence 'covered the operation.
It might be that the operation was in breach of the fares conditions on that licence, but that was a different offence.
The magistrates found the case not proved and allowed costs against the police.