236 RAILWAY RATES AND CONDITIONS 



founded. The Committee, unfortunately, failed to appreciate 

 the grievances which the witnesses of the Chamber brought 

 forward. 



" The greater part of the Majority Report consists merely of 

 a summary of the assertions of the railway managers, and on 

 page 2 the Committee interpret ' preferential treatment ' as 

 "undue preference,' and assume all the onerous duties of the 

 Railway Commission without either their experience or the 

 powers given to that body for arriving at a correct judicial 

 conclusion. 



" The Minority Report (presented by Mr. Haygarth Brown) 

 not only recognises to a greater extent the agricultural side of 

 the question, but seems also more clearly to have grasped the 

 meaning of the terms of reference. 



" The greater part of the railway cross-examination was open 

 to refutation (vide comments by Mr. Edwin Clements and Mr. 

 Waghorn, in Appendix IX., pages 295-315 of Cd. 2960), but 

 whereas the agricultural witnesses were cross-examined by 

 members of the Committee who were experts in railway tech- 

 nicalities, there were no similar railway experts to cross-examine 

 railway witnesses on behalf of the agriculturists." 



In order to present the Chamber's views, Mr. Waghorn was 

 instructed to prepare a memorandum on the report of the 

 Departmental Committee, for submission to the President 

 of the Board of Agriculture, and this report, after it had 

 been approved by the Railway Committee, was published 

 in pamphlet form.* 



On 6th March the Council instructed the Parliamentary 

 Committee to support the Mansion House Association in 

 opposing several railway Bills, in which power w T as sought 

 to enable the promoters to act as carriers on highways, apart 

 from their business as railway companies, without proper 

 restrictions as to the rates to be taken for the carriage of 

 goods. Satisfactory modifications of the clauses were obtained 

 in all the Bills of this session. 



On 23rd October the Council sent representatives to a 

 conference arranged by the Mansion House Association, on 

 " Owner's Risk." On this occasion a resolution was unani- 

 mously passed approving of a Bill, prepared by the Associa- 

 tion, entitled the " Railways (Contracts) Bill," for amending 

 the law relating to railway and canal companies' rates and 



* Published by the Central Chamber of Agriculture. 



