TRANSPORT APPEAL

Hokitika Guardian, 7 June 1932, Page 5

TRANSPORT APPEAL

POLICY GUIDING DECISIONS

COMMENT BY JUSTICE FRAZER

(By Telegraph—Ter Tress Association J

CHRISTCHURCH, June, 7. The policy guiding the decisions of the Transport Appeal Board waa outlined by. Mr Justice Frazer, yesterday, when he defined the Board’s view of what constitutes public interest in relation to transport.

A word or two had been said in regard to a monopoly for the Railway Department. He said that the object of the Act was not so much to set up a monopoly in favour of either of the Railway Department or rival motor sendee, but it was intended to check wasteful and uneconomic competition between the, different forms of transport over the same route.

In arriving at a conclusion a-s to what was desirable in the public interest, they had to consider the question of wasteful competition. If a more or less luxury service competed with the railway service to such an extent a s to prejudice the finances of that service, then it was undoubtedly wasteful.

If the railway could give a convenient, fast, and efficient service, which would supply the needs of the people, then, obviously, anyithing that cut into that service, was wasteful, and, in the long run, the people,.had to pay.