THIS DAY.

Auckland Star, Volume XVIII, Issue 93, 21 April 1887, Page 5

THIS DAY.

, (Before His Honor Mr Justice Ward.) ! The adjourned Civil Sittings were taken at i 2 o'clock this afternoon.

Auckland Hospitals and Charitable Aip Boaud v. Waipa County Council. __ Claim, £238 14s Bd, being the of defendant Council's assessed ■contributions for last year towards the maintenance of the Auckland Hos- ' itaL -The amount was equal to a rate It one-twelfth of a penny in the £. iHr Theo. Cooper (instructed by Messrs iTTesketh and Richmond) appeared for the mlaintiffs, and Messrs H. 1). Bell (Crown twciitor of Wellington) and John Hay (of Waikato) for the defendants. The i^g by the same plaintiffs against the jWaiiato- County Council for the" recovery of £277 was a^so called, and 1*1,2 * same counsel ap-peared in ifc. 'Mr. Cooper stated that ; the defence was ifounded on two propositions :. Ist, That the Weral effect of the Amendment Act of iISSO wSs to destroy any right of action which the plaintiffs might have had. 2nd, 'That if they s^ stained their right of 'action, yet as they had not performed the icondition precedent in subdividing the districts, they had noright to levy contributions Win,-those districts. In reply to his •tfgior Mr Cooper admitted that the districts » er e not subdivided.—His Honor said : Mat appears important.—Mr Cooper contended th'it there was no necessity under the Act for the Board to subdivide the district in order to levy the sums which e y Squired from the local bodies for the Maintenance of institutions .therein. — His Honor remarked upon the intricate and jnyolvbd character of the Act. —Mr Cooper he had never come across an Act which took so long a time to construe. Mr Cooper then proceeded Co deal with the second question raised by the defence, viz., irhether the plaintiffs' corporate capacity ■pas destroyed by the amendment Act of 1886, or in other words, whether, when ■the 'Amendment Act was brought iiito force, the defendants were in the plaintiff district., The plaintiff district under section, 34 of the Act of ISBS included amongst others the counties of Waipa and ■\Vaikato, but section 30 of the Amendment Act of 1886 repealed section 34, dissolved the old district, and created an Auckland district and a Waikato dis'tncfci? tiie latter consisting of the i Counties .of Waipa, Waikato, Raglan 'and; Piakb. ..This alteration, however, was only to take effect from the Ist of "April, 1887, up to which time the liability of the defendants for contributions towards ■the. plaintiff district continued. Section ■-'•40 of -the Amendment Act was merely expiatory of section 30. The position of . t: defendants was that while hoVering between heaven and earth they had schedules of a separate district before any separate district existed, and that con-, sequently any existing liability was pit "an .end. to v by section 40., He .contended -that such a construction could not be placed upon the amendment Act.—Henry Nelson Garland, Secretary of the district of Auckland Hospital and Charitable Aid Board was then called. He stated that it held its first meeting on Sth Sovember,lßßs,asgazetted, and Mr Waddel 1 -m appointed by Gazette notice. Subse■pjnfc.meetings had from time to time been 'held, and Mr Waddel was still Chairman. Qn'thelSth March, ISBO, a meeting was - -iyd/at which a resolution was passed for Itie levying of contributions. They had previously ascertained that their expenditure up toApril,lßß7, would be£9,96S, and that the /dftltietiphs referred to in section 24' would •ItawrtvA to 13,210 19s 2d, leaving a balance \iofi:6,7[>7 7s 6d. The amount payable jwas. equivalent to one-twelfth of js"vpenny' in . the pound, and the ■amounts chargeable, against the C'ounities of JVaikatoi and Waipa respectively ■were £277 Us 7d and £238 14s Sd. Notice of the resolution was sent to both bodies, but "they hadnot-yet paid. Cross-examined by Mr Bell: The levy was made upon the basis jof the.Property Tax Commissioner's assessjment. of the rateable value of property in the comities of \Vaikato and Waipa. The estimate of expenditure for the only institutions which the Board had to jprovide .for was £C,G32 for the Auckiland; Hospital, and £2,650 for the Eefoge. Re-examined : The Hospital was the Hospital for the whole-provincial district. Mr Cooper intimated that he had no further evidence to adduce.—Mr Bell, in opening , the case for the defence, said he did not intends to offCF any evidence at all. He:"; simply asked His Honor to :nonsuit the plaintiffs upon grounds •which he would proceed to disclose. There •was one thing about the Act of ISBS about.which there could be no dispute, viz,, the i distinction made in it between charitable aid and institutions. This was a broad and i cardinal feature of the Act. Charit■/ablef aid nlight be dispensed ■by the ; same Board that administered the institutions, or it might not. Two boards might unite for the purposes of .charitable aid and. yet be separate for the purposes :of institutions. Bearing this .distincAnin; mind the meaning of the Act "Would be simplified. Now the first point of the defence must be fatal to his learned friend's case. It was that Boards for the purposes of institutions must subdivide the district, but this had not been :done in the present case. The Auckland Board had disregarded section 22, and Tfitt; reference to his learned friend's contention re that section ho submitted that tekg compulsory it was merely repealed in order to? be replaced by sections which should bs directory only: There could be no contest as to the meaning of section 22—the question .was whether, it should have been complied with. He argued that it should: The learned gentle- ; ma.i_ proceeded to contend that the word ' Wajiin thissection hada eompulsorymeaning. • «c district of Waikato came into existence v®. the passing of the Act of 1886, otherwise jne district would be taxed twice over for -wesame thing. Since the passing of the had been making provision writs ovm poor and sick.—Mr Cooper said tM.hehad not been aware of this before.— wHonor remarked that at any rate'an ijttuoahle arid equitable settlement between weparties should not be difficult-of attainment. ■If it were true that Waikato had neen providing for its poor; and sick since ™6 Posing of the Amendment Act in 1886, ' wen the Auckland Board might reasonably De expected to make due allowance for i#/act • whereas, if the Waikato district !^' men'dependent upon the Auckland .-'■fw for any time after the passing of the <«V it should not grudge' paying in -Proportion therefor. Mr Cooper rehis learned friend's statement {^.^P first he had heard of any separate 'imitation- in the Waikato. In any case,, T'ft^ir Onor' s Suggestion was a good one, 'y ne would strongly recommend it to his S It,would come with very great ■,-^ight;Jr oHl the Bench, and he Jiad i™ doubt would be accepted. If the ■Wato Board had made any offer to com- / mPSB- otters might, have been settled "? wl¥Q; -~Mr BeU explained that , the viSnmTu Board had offered one-half the w«h whichit was charged. —Mr' Cooper -lv g ißuch an offev would be accepted.— ; oS^ r ■■'«» then adjourned, till 10 ■Sft mQrning in order to afford op■gj , for conference botween the