Timber Loads Alleged to be Subsidized
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Seven Vehicles Involved in Proposed Switch from Contract-A to Open A Licence
DURING an application,.last week, by J. Millican (Penton), Ltd., Penton, Carlisle, to transfer seven vehicles from contract-A to an open A licence, it was suggested that the applicants' main outward traffic could be carried at the rate offered only if it were subsidized by return loads.
Mr. B. G. Montgomery, for Millican's, told Mr. J. A. T. Hanlon, Northern Licensing Authority, that in June the applicants, who held an A licence for 14 vehicles, with 18 vehicles on contract to West Cumberland Farmers' Society, had been granted the seven vehicles on a hort-term licence to deal with an increase in timber traffic from border area forests to Bowater's new mills at Ellesmere Port. The substantive application, which, at that time, had not been published, had attracted objections from the British Transport Commission and Robsons Border Transport.
Mr. Montgomery said that, because the forests were now reaching fruition, timber traffic was increasing. Despite the extra vehicles granted on short-term licence, the applicants had had to sub-contract extensively. Their work for West Cumberland Farmers' Society was also expanding. The applicants brought back a substantial number of commodities from Lancashire and the Midlands to Cumberland and district for them.
Loss of Weight Mr. E. Millican Hope, transport manager, said that the previous week he had had to hire 18 vehicles to help with timber that had to be moved as soon as it had been cut. It lost weight and deteriorated if it were left at the roadside.
Cross-examined by Mr. T. H. Campbell Wardlaw, for Robsons Border Transport, Mr. Hope agreed that at one time Millican's were mainly concerned in the business of agricultural merchants and they had carried on business closely associated with West Cumberland Farmers' Society. In recent years they had acquired licences by purchase.
Mr. Wardlaw suggested that the applicants' business was based almost entirely on traffic coming into the area. The timber traffic was comparatively new. Asked what the vehicles had previously carried, Mr. Hope said that they worked mainly for clearing houses.
Mr. Wardlaw suggested that Mr. Hope was distorting completely the importance of timber traffic.
Questioned by Mr. F. J. McHugh, for the Commission, about earnings, Mr. Hope said that there had been a 5-percent. cut in rates.
Mr. Hanlon: "Is that because there have been too many vehicles chasing too little work?"
Mr. Hope replied that he did not know. He was referring to traffic coming into the area by way of return loads. The timber rates had remained the same.
Several representatives of timber contractors spoke of the excellent service given by the applicants.
One witness, Mr. P. Ryland, agreed that the sole reason his company chose Millican's to carry the timber was because they provided the cheapest facility. He had advertised in the local newspaper for tenders from hauliers to carry the timber, because they were not getting sufficient vehicles from Millican's. and they wanted another "string to their bow." Mr. Wardlaw: "You got a reply from Robsons Border Transport, asking for further particulars, but you never followed it up ? "
Mr. Ryland replied that that was so. The price was higher than they were paying Millicans and his company declined to consider it.
Mr. Wardlaw said the applicants were carrying a tremendous amount of traffic into the area which was subsidizing the conveyance of timber. Other hauliers could carry a load of timber to Ellesmere Port at the rates offered only if they could get 'return loads. A witness agreed that this was so, but the rates offered for timber haulage had to be competitive.
The application was adjourned.