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'Operating Centre' something is amiss
Page 57
Page 58
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WONDER just how much effect the 1 remarks of the chairman of the London Sessions Appeals Committee concerning laxness within the office of the Metropolitan Licensing Authority will have on the Ministry. The chairman, Mr. R. E. Seaton—who, with certain magistrates, was hearing a re-trial of the protracted, expensive and (in my view) tragic case concerning traffic consultant Ralph Cropper—made severe criticisms about the way applications were dealt with. The more he listened to the case, he said, the more it became clear that both the Ministry and the people dealing with it were as lax as they could be about the regulations. When counsel representing the Ministry intervened to say that he did not think such remarks were quite fair, Mr. Seaton commented: "That is my impression."
His views must have been further strengthened when he heard Mr. J. Guy, clerk to the Metropolitan Licensing Authority, say in evidence that an operating centre was "a very difficult thing to define".
Something Should Be Done
Surely, one would have thought. if the top civil servant in the Licensing Authority's office finds difficulty in defining an operating centre (or base, to give it its usual haulage term) something should be done to simplify matters.
Section 171(4) of the 1960 Road Traffic Act states that " operating centre" means the permanent base or centre from which it is intended that the authorized vehicles will normally be used for the carriage of goods for hire or reward.'
Solicitor Mr. Tom Corpe, in his muchquoted book "Corpe on Road Haulage Licensing". states that it is not easy to clarify this description further. He goes on to mention ceitain points that appear from decisions of the Transport Tribunal -namely, that the declaration of a permanent base or centre does not necessarily denote the carrying of goods from that place. Whether the vehicle starts from a place empty or loaded it can be said to be used from that place for the purpose of carrying goods.
Mr. Corpe further points out that in two appeal decisions—Wright Bros. (Wolverhampton) Ltd., and John McRae (Transport) Ltd.--the Tribunal has ruled that a base should consist of some readily identifiable premises from which the vehicles are physically controlled and should not be a mere accommodation address. It should, moreover, have a postal address. In its judgment in one of the recent Arthur 'T. Booth (Manchester) Ltd. appeals, the Tribunal stated that, apart from a brief mention in Section 171(1) there was no further reference to operating centre" in any
other section of the Act. An operating centre could not, therefore, he identified by reference to objective facts ascertainable with precision at the date of the making of the application, the Tribunal added. Invited on numerous occasions to be more specific on the matter, the Tribunal has declined to go further.
"Widespread" The offence of which Mr. Cropper was eventually convicted was making a false statement to the Licensing Authority when applying for the variation of an A licence. Giving sentence, the chairman of the Appeals Committee said it was apparent that it was "pretty widespread because others have done it ". The committee, he continued, felt that an example had to be made " to stop it ".
Certainly, in cases of deliberate fraud, punishment should be meted out.. But, bearing in mind the remarks of Mr. Guy in the court (which I have quoted above), and not forgetting the utterances of Mr. Corpe and others on the object of operating centres, I suggest that something is amiss with the wording of this particular section of the Act, and something should be done.