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56
pose the Bills on second reading, and to take every
possible measure to prevent the same from becoming
law.
4. That, in the event of the Bills being promoted by the
National Telephone Company passing the second reading,
the Corporation be asked to arrange another Conference,
with a view to decide as to the best means of
continuing the opposition to the said Bills.
To which resolutions the Vestry have agreed.
The Vestry also appointed delegates to a Conference
between representatives of the Council and of
London Local Authorities held at the County Hall
on June 14th, upon the subject of the London Telephone
Service, when the following resolutions were
passed:—
1. That in the opinion of this Conference the present Telephone
Service of the London area, as supplied by the
National Telephone Company, is both inefficient and
inadequate; that the charges, as compared to those
made by the same company in the provinces, are much
too high, and that these disadvantages to London are
largely due to the abandonment by the Post Office of
that principal of competition which was expressly
adopted prior to 1892 for the protection of telephone
users.
2. That this Conference views with alarm the action of
the Post Office in using, for the benefit of the National
Telephone Company, its special powers as to the
breaking up of streets, as instanced in the recent case
of the Commissioners of Sewers and the Post Office;
and urges the Select Committee on Telephones, which
is now sitting at the House of Commons, to preserve intact
that control over the streets which has hitherto
been vested in the Municipal Authorities.
3. I hat, in the event of the Post Office not undertaking the
Telephone Service, it is desirable that the local and
central authorities of the London Telephone District
should at once combine to secure for the county an
efficient and cheap Municipal Telephone Service.
The Vestry also expressed its entire concurrence
with, and satisfaction at, the report of the Select
Committee of the House of Commons on telephones,