COAL VEND CASES.

Evening Post, Volume LXXXII, Issue 150, 22 December 1911, Page 7

COAL VEND CASES.

JUDGMENT NOT YET CON' ' CLUDED. COMBINES PURPOSE TO RAISE PRICES TO UTMOST LIMIT. 8* Telegraph — Praia Aiioclatkm.— Copyright. SYDNEY, 21st December. _ Delivery of the judgment was con* tinued throughout to-day, and is still unfinished. Mr. Justice Isaacs declared that the conduct of the defendants would seem to indicate that it Was their intention to combine for the purpose of raising the prices of coal to a height limited only by the possibility of obtaining them. Dealing with the shipping companies, his Honour said that they carried on the excess imposed by the Vend, and were just tis much responsible as the colliery proprietors. Before ■ the combined agreement was arrived at tiie shippers played off one colliery against another. Thus the shipping defendants must bo held responsible, even if detri* ment to the public interest travelled no further than a declaration that excessive prices were pronounced by the Vend and executed by the shipping companies. But the detriment proceeded further than this, the companies using their powers of combination for the additional advantage of themselves.