The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1844-07-23 00:00:00

TUESDAY MORNING, JULY 23, 1844.

There is a certain degree of plausibility in the ar-
guments of the parties by whom the Railways Regu-
lation Bill of Mr. Gladstone is opposed ; but with-
out pledging ourselves to an approval of all the
clauses, or all the principles, involved in that bill,
the most objectionable of which may probably be
got rid of in committee, we are yet heartily rejoiced
to see the subject taken into the hands of govern-
ment. It is, and has long been to us, an ob-
ject of no light consideration to see growing up
around us a system, protected in the exclusive pri-
vileges which the legislature has con erred upon it,
and practically exercising a monopoly which time
may render almost intolerable; operating to pro-
duce vast changes over the whole face of the em-
pire; in one place throwing back once-thriving and
busy towns and districts into comparative abandon-
ment and distress, and in another causing new hives
of active industry to spring up as by enchantment;
and all this without any superior control being exer-
cised by the state which has created it, to prevent an
injurious and oppressive exercise of the great
powers which it possesses, for good as for evil.
Long ago, the state might have stepped in, advan-
tageously, with its claim of a dii ecting and super-
vising right ; and at the present moment, when a
capital of 70 or 80 millions has already been em-
barked in the erection of a property in whose proper
management the public are largely interested, and
capital of twice that amount is preparing to be simi-
larly invested, the duty of government so to in-
terfere has become, we submit, imperative.
We are quite ready to admit the expediency and
justice of proper respect being paid by any govern-
ment to the vested or prescriptive rights of all
classes, even the humblest classes of the people;
and hence we recognise it as right that the bill be-
fore us should not bear about it the character of an
ex post facto measure. If we have erred, in first
setting up the railway system in Great Britain as
one of monopoly, we have no right to visit the con-
sequences of our own remissness upon unfortunate
proprietors. Such a delicacy, however, may easily
be pushed too far. We may refuse to interfere
actively between the public and established compa-
nies, notwithstanding proved exactions, and want
of consideration for the public convenience and ad-
vantage ; but, if we do this, we are surely bound to
withdraw some of those difficulties, (with which we
have hedged round those established companies,
and which constitute the essence of their privilege
of monopoly,) and permit other parties to step in
and afford us those facilities which they withhold.
In plain terms, if established companies refuse
either to consult the public convenience or to per-
mit legislative interference with their management,
we are bound, in justice to ourselves, to place re-
strictions upon the power which they possess of
obstructing, by expensive opposition in Parliament-
ary committees, the efforts of others to supply what
they refuse.

An instance of the exercise, or, rather, abuse, of
this power, is before us, in the case of the recent
disagreement between the Grand Junction and the
London and Birmingham Companies. These two
leviathans of the railway world split upon the sub-
ject of the support which each was affording to
newly-projected lines, which were said to interfere
with the prosperity of the other. And how was the
dispute at length arranged ? Why, by the ratifica-
tion of terms something like the following :—viz.,
firstly, the formation of an alliance, offensive and
defensive, between them, against all competing
lines; secondly, a transfer of all benefit to arise
from the proposed Holyhead Line to the London
and Birmingham Company ; thirdly, an arrange-
ment that the proposed Shrewsbury Line was to be
in abeyance for the present, but was ultimately to
be carried out by the Grand Junction Company;
fourthly, that the Trent Valley Line was to be pro-
secuted upon the plan originally proposed; and,
lastly, that the Grand Junction were to withdraw
their support from the London and York scheme.
Here, then, we have two great companies, with
whose affairs Government dare not at present even
propose to interfere, usurping the powers of Parlia-
ment, arranging what line of railway is to be prose-
cuted and what to be left "in abeyance"; dictating
what tract of country is to be left without a railway,
and what is to be favoured with their permission to
possess such a boon. The Holyhead Railway may
be formed ; but it must be made tributary to the
pockets of the London and Birmingham proprie-
tary; the people of Shrewsbury are to wait upon
the sublime pleasure of both companies. The Val-
ley of the Trent is to be supplied with its railway,
which will not materially interfere with London and
Birmingham dividends ; the " London and York
Direct Line" is to be discouraged, because it will so
interfere!

We must protest against the justice of this kind
of dictation (for to such it amounts)—this parcelling
out of the country as if it were their own—on the
part of companies who object to all kind of interfe-
rence with themselves. What is it but to say to
the public, " You shall not compel us to carry
cheap ; and yet we will use your own money to pre-
vent you, by our Parliamentary and other influence,
from procuring cheapness from other quarters " ?
We set out, however, with giving in our adhesion
to the abstract justice and truth of a great portion
of the arguments offered against Mr. Gladstone's
bill. We admit such justice ; we want to see it
administered. It is urged that free competition will
regulate ultimately the price, and compel the com-
fort of railway travelling; but we want to see a little
of such competition. We cannot admit that y
particular line
be-
cause a company has got hold of an
of country, we are to have no other line formed—no
" competing line !" We cannot, above all, agree to
the principle that any line, which (because formed
previously to the present session) objects to super.
vision, should be permitted to oppose in committee