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Aviation History
1961
1961 - 0460.PDF
Hands up all those who thought both aircraft in these two top pictures were Bristol Britannias AIR COMMERCE... FIRST HEARING AT THERESE HOUSE FOR the Air Transport Licensing Board's first hearing in its newhome on the ground floor of Therese House, GlasshouseYard, in the City of London, the seven members of the Board faced barely a handful of applicants, objectors and their advisers.The combined attraction of new offices and the possibility of seeing and hearing the new chairman (see col. 2) was obviously notsufficiently powerful to draw more than one or two observers. In the event, Prof Jack did not take the chair, and it was the deputychairman, Mr A. H. Wilson, who led the board members on to the dais of the pleasant and spacious new court room. A photographof it appears on page 473. During the next fifty minutes the Board considered, in courteousbut probing detail, joint applications by Channel Air Bridge and Channel Airways for seasonal inclusive tour services, on behalf oftwo travel agents, from Southend to Ostend—services which last year were undertaken by another operator and had since beenrelinquished. Both operators, as Mr Whybrow of Channel Air Bridge carefully explained, wanted as far as possible to avoid emptylegs on these and similar charter services, and they proposed to integrate their services so that both would carry either Blue Cars'or Lunns' passengers to suit their schedules. "It's no more than that?" asked Mr Wilson. "Not a mixing of services ?" "No," wasthe reply, "one sector, one operator, and no integrated loads." Nor was it the intention, Mr Whybrow explained in answer toanother question about the application of a B licence, to make these nights available to the general public. Both airlines want tooperate DC-4s, which could then be partly amortized in the summer before being committed to the workshops in the winter for con-version to vehicle-carrying Carvairs. (Channel Air Bridge are to take ten of these DC-4 conversions; Channel Airways will constructtheirs from kits of parts.) "When do you intend to start?" asked the deputy chairman,who had up to that point monopolized the questioning. Told mid-April, he asked, with a twinkle under lifted eyebrows: "Then Isuppose that you have already taken bookings ... on the pre- sumption that it would be all right?" Procedure at this fourth public hearing was that the Boardlistened to the case put forward by Channel Air Bridge and Channel Airways—Mr Hugo Parsons for the latter merely signifying his agreement with what Mr Whybrow had said—and then listened tothe objections that Cunard Eagle had to make. The Board avoided the short cut apparently adopted by the AT AC of allowing theapplicant to forestall, if he could, the objections that were expected. As sole objectors (British Railways having withdrawn) CunardEagle claimed that—although "their arithmetic might be a little shaky"—if maximum capacity was offered from Southend through-out the season, traffic could be diverted from their scheduled services from London. But Mr Guinane, Cunard Eagle's deputymanaging director, later agreed that "they could sustain no objec- tion if capacity only covered traffic booked this year"—a pointrather laboriously explored while the Board unravelled to their own satisfaction the implications of six flights weekly to be operated bythe two airlines on behalf of one travel agent and between six and 19 to be operated on behalf of the other. Another objection by Mr Guinane—concerning the five-yearperiod of validity for which the two airlines had applied—led Mr Wilson to comment that it was early days for the Board to bethinking in terms of five-year licences. He asked "Would you take it hardly if you were licensed for this year, and you could comeback again?" He was met with polite acquiescence, but with the rider that both operators were very anxious to plan their fleets,and that in any case they would be back very shortly with applica- tions for the 1962 season. This first case in the board's new headquarters demanded nodecisions on matters of principle; explanations aside it was straight- forward and, as was subsequently remarked, "would have beendealt with in half the time by the old ATAC." But it emphasized the care that the board's seven—now eight—Solomons are takingto feel their way before the big battles yet to come, and which are obviously in the forefront of their minds. A hint of this was given in a fast ball bowled by the Board atMr Guinane. Of Cunard Eagle's objection that traffic might be diverted from their scheduled services Mr Baldry asked: "Youdon't object to material diversion, do you?" "We would like notice of that question," was the reply, which evoked from MrW. P. James the rejoinder: "obviously the objector of today is the applicant of tomorrow." A. T. P. LORD TERRINGTON'S SUCCESSOR QUALIFIED approval will greet the appointment by theMinister of Aviation of Prof Daniel Thomson Jack as the new chairman of the Air Transport Licensing Board. Hetook up his new post on April 1, but will act as part-time chair- man until his other appointments can be terminated. Lord Terrington's untimely death on January 7 left a gap thathas been hard to fill. Although, in common with the majority of the members of the Licensing Bouxd, Prof Jack has no experienceof the aviation or airline industries, he brings special qualities of his own to the board at a time when its wisdom and judgment areabout to be put to their first searching test. Prof Jack has been David Dale Professor of Economics at theUniversity of Durham since 1935. He is perhaps best known to those in aviation for his handling of the London Airport dispute in1958, but he has wide experience in industrial arbitration work and in the conduct of Government enquiries into economic andindustrial matters at home and overseas—he was, for instance, a member of the Monckton Commission on Central Africa last year.He was also a member of the Industrial Disputes Tribunal between 1951 and 1959. Photograph: page 473. Now being shown by Boeing Vertol division is a mock-up of the interior of the Vertol 107, due to enter service with New York Airways later this year. It has been designed by Walter Dorwin league Associates
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