234 RAILWAY RATES AND CONDITIONS 



into operation was delayed until 1908 ; still, it has been of 

 some service, if only in that it has induced railway companies 

 to be more careful. Certainly fewer fires have occurred from 

 this cause since that date. 



19O4. 



The Lancashire and Yorkshire Railway Company promoted 

 a private Bill this year, and on its second reading Sir Wm. 

 Tomlinson (on behalf of the Mansion House Association) 

 moved an instruction to the Committee with the object of 

 enabling traders to ascertain how " through " rates from 

 foreign places are made up. He pointed out that these 

 " through " rates often included in one charge the foreign 

 rate, all dock, harbour and shipping charges, carriage by sea 

 and the home railway rate ; but that, if this total were 

 divided under the five heads specified, it would be at once 

 evident whether or no preference was being given to foreign 

 produce. The Chamber issued a whip to their members in 

 support of this instruction, but as usual the railway interest 

 was too strong, and the instruction was lost by 103 votes to 79. 

 Eighteen members of the Chamber voted against and fifteen 

 for it, Sir Courtenay Warner seconding it on behalf of the 

 Chamber. 



In May the Earl of Onslow appointed a Departmental 

 Committee of the Board of Agriculture to inquire into the 

 rates charged by railway companies in Great Britain, in 

 respect of the carriage of foreign and colonial produce, and 

 to report whether there was evidence of preferential treat- 

 ment accorded to such produce. It was a badly constituted 

 Committee, for the railway interest was much too strongly 

 represented upon it. Lord Jersey was nominated as Chair- 

 man and Mr. E. G. Hay garth Brown was appointed to 

 represent the Board of Agriculture. The Chamber made 

 an effort to get one or two more agriculturists added to it, 

 and after some pressure from Sir Edward Strachey, the 

 name of Mr. George Lambert, M.P., was added. He, however, 

 soon retired from the position, on becoming a Junior Lord 

 of the Admiralty. 



