240 RAILWAY RATES AND CONDITIONS 



forward by the Council were touched upon. The Railway 

 Committee were requested to name suitable representatives 

 of agriculture to sit on it, but none of the gentlemen suggested 

 were asked to serve. 



1909. 



The Bill foreshadowed the previous year to amalgamate 

 the Great Northern and Great Central Railways was intro- 

 duced early this year, but now the Great Eastern Company 

 was included in it. The Railway Committee took active 

 steps to secure a locus standi to appear before the Committee 

 to which the Bill was to be referred, but this proved to be 

 unnecessary, as practically everyone was empowered to file 

 petitions. An Instruction was put on the paper by Sir Francis 

 Channing, among others, on behalf of the Council, and a 

 whip was sent to Members of Parliament asking them to 

 support it. The terms of this Instruction were : 



". . . To consider, and if deemed desirable to insert, 

 clauses requiring that the companies shall not give preference 

 in rates or conditions where agricultural produce or requisites 

 are concerned, between different parts of the area served by the 

 companies. That no existing rates shall be raised nor facilities 

 withdrawn where agricultural traffic is concerned, and that 

 complaints of unreasonable or preferential rates or conditions 

 in respect of agricultural traffic in the area served by the com- 

 panies shall be submitted to the Board of Agriculture, and 

 authorising that Board to make such orders thereon as shall to 

 them appear to be reasonable." 



There was, however, no opportunity of moving this, as 

 when the Bill was read a second time, on 5th April, by a 

 majority of fourteen, the President of the Board of Trade 

 (Mr. Churchill) moved its committal to a Select Committee 

 with an Instruction in much wider terms than the foregoing. 

 On 26th April the companies withdrew their Bill, giving as 

 their reasons the wide terms of the Instruction to the Com- 

 mittee and the granting of a locus standi to practically every- 

 body, and that these conditions would have so prolonged the 

 inquiry that the expense involved would have been greater 

 than the companies felt justified in incurring. 



