45 8 History of Inland Transport 



made by Mr Emile Garcke in an article published in " The 

 Times Engineering Supplement " of July 25, 1906, where he 

 says : 



" The right of veto is exercised not so much with the desire 

 to destroy a projected enterprise, but rather to exact the 

 utmost conditions which a promoter will accept sooner than 

 abandon the project. When a scheme is proceeded with in spite 

 of these exactions it is taken as evidence that the conditions 

 imposed have not been exacting enough ; and whenever the 

 operating company has occasion subsequently to ask the local 

 authority to approve anything, the company is expected to 

 offer more than commensurate consideration, although the 

 object for which the approval is desired may be primarily for 

 the benefit of the public. All these obstacles imply increased 

 capital outlay or increased working costs, and perhaps both. 

 If, notwithstanding these conditions, the company earns a 

 moderate profit, it is accused of striving only after dividends 

 to the prejudice of the public. If non-success of the enterprise 

 follows, then the company is accused of being over-capitalised 

 and mismanaged, and it has come to be considered an im- 

 pertinence for a company to offer ever so mild a protest." 



On the same subject it is stated in "The Dangers of 

 Municipal Trading," by Robert P. Porter (1907) : 



" The use of the veto has had disastrous effects on private 

 enterprise. In many districts it has led to utter stagnation 

 of personal initiative. Good schemes have been barred by 

 local authorities out of pure caprice or prejudice. Other 

 schemes have been allowed to proceed under barely tolerable 

 conditions ; the undertaking has been crippled from the start 

 by the high price municipalities have exacted for their consent. 

 Others, again, have been withdrawn by the promoter because 

 he found it impossible to agree to the extortionate demands 

 of the governing bodies." 



Mr Porter quotes various authorities who have expressed 

 strong views on the subject of the veto. 



The chairman of the Parliamentary Committee which 

 considered a scheme of tramways promoted in Scotland said : 

 " The Committee desire to put on record that in their opinion 

 the original scheme was a good one, and calculated to be of 

 much use to the district ; but it has been so mutilated and 

 loaded with conditions by conflicting interests and the ex- 



