342 History of Inland Transport 



The undertaking thus given failed to satisfy the Select 

 Committee appointed in 1893 to inquire into these further 

 grievances. The Committee, in their report, expressed the 

 opinion that the course taken by the companies had been 

 " mainly actuated by their determination to recoup them- 

 selves to the fullest extent by raising the rates of articles 

 where the maximum rates were above the actual rates." 

 They were of opinion that the rates not reduced by the new 

 maxima should have been left untouched ; and they affirmed 

 that " the margin between the old actual rates and the present 

 Parliamentary maxima was not given by Parliament in order 

 that immediate advantage should be taken of it, or that the 

 policy of recoupment should be carried on, but only to meet 

 certain contingencies, such as rises in prices and wages," etc. 

 They also recommended that further steps should be taken 

 to protect traders from any unreasonable raising of rates 

 within the maxima, the Railway and Canal Commission being 

 empowered to deal with such questions as they arose. 



The outcome of all this controversy was the passing by 

 Parliament, in the following Session, of the Railway and Canal 

 Traffic Act, 1894, which introduced an entirely new principle 

 in railway operation. 



Turnpike trustees had always had full power to reduce and 

 subsequently to advance their tolls, at their own discretion, 

 provided they never sought to exceed the maxima imposed 

 under their special Acts ; and down to this time it had been 

 assumed that railway companies had similar powers in regard 

 to maxima which Parliament had already expressly sanctioned 

 in the Act or Acts of each individual company. There was 

 and still is no question (except in cases of "undue preference " 

 or " through rates ") as to the right of a company to reduce 

 a rate, or to transfer a commodity to a lower class, thus 

 effecting the same object; and there was, down to 1894, 

 equally thought to be no question as to their right to increase 

 a rate within the same limitations as those applying to turn- 

 pike trustees. 



What the Act of 1894 did was to restrict the powers of rail- 

 way companies to increase their rates even within the range of 

 their statutory maxima. It enacted that in the event of 

 complaints being^made of any increase of rates, direct or 

 indirect, since December, 1892 (and under the Act of 1888 



