GROWTH OF RAILWAYS

Evening Post, Volume CXIII, Issue 112, 14 May 1927, Page 17

GROWTH OF RAILWAYS

LAW ABOUT TRANSPORT

LECTURE BY MR. M. DENNEHY

The Wellington branch of the 1 Railway Officers' Institute has organised a series of lectures during the present year, and the inaugural lecture was delivered by Mr; M. Dennehy, New Zealand Railways Law Officer, last Thursday evening, when the chairman of the branch (Mr. L. AikenJ presided over an attendance of more than 100, members. ' ' >

The subject chosen by Mr. Dennehy was "The standard of care required in , the carriage of goods consigned at owners' risk," and, in view of the' road competition with the railway, the subject was o£ special interest to railwaymen. Mr. Dennehy traced the history of the law relating to the carriage of goods by road and rail from the earliest times up to the present, and pointed out that without a highly-efficient transport service our pres-ent-day civilisation could not endure. In view of recent developments in other countries in the study of transport, one wondered at times whether the people were not a little too self-complacent in this Dominipri. Mr. Dennehy detailed the most important features of the British Carriers' Act of ,1830, the British Railway and Canal. Traffic Act of 1854, and the New Zealand Government Railways Acts of 1921 and 1926, showing how legislation had evolved in accordance with the needs of £he times. He defined the term "common carrier" as. "a carrier who holds himself out as willing and ready to carry for payment the goods 1 of anyone who chooses to employ him," and stated that, if a car-' rier restricted his services to a certain individual or individuals, he was not a common carrier; but he need not be a common carrier of every class of goods. The Minister's liability at common law, company risk, and /owners' risk, were exhaustively dealt with by the lecturer. In dealing with the evolution of transport, Mr. Dennehy said that, from the commencement of the reign of the locomotive, the enormous saving in time and expense enabled the English railway companies to compete successfully with road earners, and the companies very rapidly got the better of the situation. : The companies dictated terms to the public, not only in the matter of rates, but also by limiting their liability in respect of the goods they undertook to carry. They also refused, to be common carriers of certain classes of goods. The public were in consequence greatly inconvenienced, and Parliament had had to interfere. It was therefore, interesting to reflect that more than seventy years ago the powerful English railway, companies had practically silenced opposition from road carriers; but that to-day the same companies were in certain directions fighting for their very existence against road competition, in which man s inventions and discoveries were playing a prominent part. One was impelled to speculate as to what might be the findings of the historian of seventy years hence. As far as railways were concerned, would it be romance or tragedy?

At the conclusion of the lecture a keen discussion, lasting over an houi', took place, and, on the motion.of Mr. M. J. Forde, a hearty vote of thanks was accorded Mr. Denneby for his illuminating lecture. .In acknowledging-the vote, Mr. Dennehy. consented, in accordance with the unanimously-expressed Wish of the meeting, to deliver a further lecture dealing with other .aspects of the question that had been raised during the discussion.