Omnibus Owners' Association Holds Final Meeting
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ON June 24, the Omnibus Owners' Association held an extraordinary general meeting to approve the merger with the Public Service Transport Association, and to pass resolutions regarding the winding up, etc.
The chairman of the Association, Mr. J. S. Wills, presided. He said the occasion should not pass unnoticed, although throughout its long-and useful life, covering 44 years, the body had, rightly or wrongly, sought no publicity. [We can endorse the chairman's remarks as to the difficulty of obtaining news from the Association, and might mention that its services would probably have been rendered even more useful if publicity bad been given to them.—En.]
The Association was formed in 1899 as the London Omnibus Owners Federation, the bus proprietors at that time feeling the need for a united front against encroachments by municipal ,trading. Meanwhile the Tramways and Light Railways Association was busy upholding the rights of rail-bound road-transport media: Consequently, • the two associations were for many years in opposite camps, but development occurred as the needs of their members changed, and in 1914 was started, in the office of the L.O.O.F., a new organization on similar lines to protect the interests of provincial bus operators. This was the Provincial Omnibus Owners Association. Three years later the latter two bodies were merged to form the London and Provincial Omnibus Owners Association, the latest title being adopted in 1929.
During its career the Association examined hundreds of Parliamentary Bills, successfully opposing, or procuring improvements in many of them.
In later years it found itself in increasingly close touch with the P.S.T.A. (which was a later development of the T.L.R.A.), especially owing to the gradual disappearance of the electric tram, with the result that much of the work was duplicated, and
both bodies were advised that the easiest course was to wind up the two and form a new Association.
The chairman expressed grateful thanks to Mr. Laurence G. Oldfield, F.C:A., for the valuable services which he had rendered to the Association for 42 out of its 44 years. He knew that they would all be sorry that this was the last occasion on which Mr. OldfiEt,1 would be acting as secretary; being an accountant with a busy practice, he had decided to retire from association work upon the accomplishment of the merger.
Three resolutions, concerning the merger agreement, the liquidation of the O.O.A. with Mr. Oldfield as liquidator, and the transference of property to the Public Transport Association, were passed.
Finally, Mr. R. J. Howley, C.B.E. (chairman, B.E.T. Co., Ltd.). proposed a resolution expressing the appreciation, of the meeting at the work of Mr. Wills during his two years' tenure of the chair. This was seconded by Mr. Stanley Kennedy, of Thomas Tilling, Ltd., and carried enthusiastically.