UNLICENSED BUSES

Sun (Auckland), Volume III, Issue 636, 12 April 1929, Page 11

UNLICENSED BUSES

MAGISTRATE DISMISSES CHARGE NO OFFENCE UNDER ACT A case of considerable importance to bus owners has been the subject of a considered judgment given by Mr E. C. Outten, S.M. Mr. Cutten finds that buses without licences may cater for race traffic at special fares without committing an offence under the Motor Omnibus Traffic Act. The case was one in which a Inis owner named Stokes was prosecuted for carrying on an omnibus sen ice within the area of the No. 2 Licensing Authority without a licence to carry on the service. Briefly the facts were that Stokes used a bus to carry passengers from the ferry wharf to the Takapuna races, charging Is for each passenger. Another bus-owning organisation runs a regular service past the race-course at a fare of about 3d. THE REGULATIONS The question to be decided by the magistrate was whether defendant carried on a service in contravention of section 5 of the Act. which reads: It shall not be lawful for any person to carry on within a motor omnibus district any motor omnibus service otherwise than pursuant to the authority and in conformity with the terms of a licence granted by a licensing authority under this Act.” “I do not think that the defendant can be said to be carrying on such a service,” said Mr. Cutten in his judgment. “The term ‘service’ as used in the Act seems to imply some regularity and continuity. “The defendant had no time-table, it was a special occasion when, owing to the Takapuna races, there were large numbers of people to be carried from the wharf to the racecourse. “It is true that there are other services licensed to carry passengers on a route which passes the racecourse, but what the defendant was doing would not interfere with them, because the fare charged by these licensed services for the distance from the wharf to the racecourse would be much less than the defendant’s charges, and they could not possibly carry this traffic in their licensed buses. REGULARITY OF SERVICE “Even admitting that there are three or four race meetings or similar meetings during tlie year and that the defendant made a practice of carrying passengers as described above on each occasion, he would not. in my opinion, be carrying on a service within the meaning of the Act. On the other hand if the defendant made a practice, or even on one occasion joined with others who made a practice of running in direct opposition to an existing service at week-ends, or on other occasions on which there was an increased volume of traffic, I think that would be a breach of the Act. “In such case I think it might be taken that the defendant would, in an unauthorised way and with a vehicle which was not licensed for the purpose, be taking part in the existing service, and he thus would be carrying on a service otherwise than pursuant to the authority and in conformity with the terms of a licence granted under the Act. “The ordinary services could not deal with the race traffic except by using a large number of unlicensed vehicles, and in so doing they would be doing precisely the same as the defendant, and, if such is a breach of the Act, would as well as he be committing a breach. "Abnormal traffic such as that in question which occurs on irregular occasions, to meet which it would be impossible for an authorised service to have the necessary number of vehicles licensed under the Act, and in respect of which the fares charged for the journey involved would not be countenanced by a licensing authority under the Act, is not, in my opinion, intended to be dealt with by the Act.”