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DLA misdirected himself, Tribunal told

29th November 1968
Page 41
Page 41, 29th November 1968 — DLA misdirected himself, Tribunal told
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Which of the following most accurately describes the problem?

• No judgment was given by the Transport Tribunal on the appeal of Chris Metcalfe Ltd., heard in London on Thursday of last week. The Transport Holding Co. (BRS Ltd.) was respondent to the appeal.

Mr. G. P. Crowe, for the appellant cornpany, explained that the appeal arose from the refusal of the Yorkshire deputy LA to grant the appellant an additional vehicle not exceeding 5 tons on its A licence.

This, said Mr. Crowe, was a simple appeal without any question of principle. The appellant was a parcels and smalls operator based at Keighley and operated 30 A-licensed vehicles with a normal user of general goods, Great Britain. A large proportion—some 60 per cent—of the appellant's business was concerned with import and export work. He operated a nightly trunk service to London, a daily service to Liverpool, Birkenhead, Salford Docks and Hull and a twice-weekly service to Lancashire and the Midlands, and also ran a fleet of 14 B-licensed vehicles on collection and delivery work.

The deputy LA, he contended, had misdirected himself on the evidence in the case and had refused the application on the grounds that (i) no separate figures had been produced as regards the earnings of the Alicensed vehicles and (ii) that inconvenience caused to customers had been due to delays at docks, to which a grant of an additional trunking vehicle would have made no difference.

On the first point, both Mr. Crowe and Mr. R. M. Yorke, for the THC, were agreed that it was impossible to separate the earnings of trunking vehicles from those of collection and delivery vehicles.

Mr. Crowe referred the Tribunal to the letters from 15 different customers which had been produced at the public inquiry. These were complaints from those who had employed Metcalfe's vehicles and whose consignments had not been delivered in time. This was not due solely to delays at docks, said Mr. Crowe, but also to a lack of transport facilities.

BRS's objection to such a small application he considered "an instance of bad faith". BRS Parcels Ltd., he contended, was the cornpetitor, and it was not surprising that the witness from BRS Ltd. could not supply any evidence pertaining to the parcels operations.

Mr. Yorke said that the objection had been made by the THC, and only one part of the

holding company could object. In this case, the applicant had not published his intent of carrying parcels traffic. He would advise his client to object to every Metcalfe application until the applications contained all the ConAitions under which the company wished to operate.

Adding an extra trunking vehicle to the fleet, he said, would not solve the problem of dock delays. The only answer would be for Metcalfe to open a collection and delivery depot in London. At the moment the company was adding to congestion by sending partloaded vehicles to the docks.

The Tribunal will give its judgment in writ ing.

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Organisations: Transport Tribunal
Locations: London, Liverpool

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