2 74 AGRICULTURAL DEPRESSION 



4-ton lots. The preference enabled Cardiff to undersell 

 Liverpool at Birmingham by 3d to 4d a sack. The 

 company argued that the Liverpool rate was reasonable, 

 and that the low Cardiff rates could not be raised, as 

 they were necessary to secure the traffic in the interests 

 of the public, because of the low competing rates from 

 the Severn ports. 



Mr Justice Wills delivered an elaborate judgment, as 

 this was the first interpretation of the section. He held 

 that the justifications, because of competition and because 

 of the impossibility of re-adjustment without undue re- 

 duction to the complainant, are matters which only may 

 be taken into account, and in addition to all the other 

 considerations. On the one hand the commercial in- 

 terests of the company were not to be disregarded 

 unless the public also were interested in securing the 

 traffic, nor on the other hand was the mere question of 

 securing the traffic, even in the interests of the public, to 

 be conclusive in favour of the company. 



The inequalities complained of were in themselves 

 illegal, and it was immaterial even to prove existing 

 injury to trade. They could not be justified on the 

 ground that the traffic could not be secured, unless the 

 rates from Cardiff were thus low, because no interest of 

 the public was established in securing an alternative 

 route, as such a route already existed. 



But the subsequent case of the Liverpool Corn Traders' 

 Association v. the Great Western Railway Company was 

 decided in August 1892 in precisely the opposite sense. 

 This judgment seems to have been governed by the 

 decision of the Court of Appeal in the case of Phipps v. 

 the London and North Western Railway Company, in 

 March 1892, when Lord Herschell held that the fact 

 that a trader had access to a competing route for the 

 carriage of his goods, may be taken into consideration 

 by the Railway Commissioners or the Court, in deciding 

 whether lower rates charged to such trader are an undue \ 

 preference under the Acts of 1854 ^'^d 1888. Lord 

 Herschell held that the Act of 1888 did not alter the 

 considerations under the Act of 1854, but made it clear 



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