DOUBLE PROPRIETARY.

Auckland Star, Volume XXXVIII, Issue 253, 23 October 1907, Page 5

DOUBLE PROPRIETARY.

WHEN IS A BUSINESS PLACE CLOSED. .. .. • The Inspector of Factories '(Mr Jas. Hhan.aghan, proceeded against. Jtooiah Daniel Webster at the Police Court this morning for failure to close his shop at one o'clock on the • statutory closing day. Mr W. Fallon conducted for the prosecution and Dr. Bamford appeared for the defendant. The case was one in which the question was involved as to whether two businesses could be carried: on in one shop by separate persons, wlien the Act demanded that a statutory closing day should be observed: in regard to ' one of the businesses, the other business being exempt. The shop occupied by defendant is carried on in his name as a frujfc shop, but a portion of it is'fused b)' his wife as a fioriat, her name being over one window, and her business being, according to the defendant's statement, conducted by her as entirely distinct from his. This, however, did not come up to the requirements of the inspector, who said that to comply with the Act it was necessary that the florist part of the shop, the: business which has to observe the half-day closing hours, must have a permanent and distinct entrance, and be so divided from the other shop that no communication, can take place between the two. Mrs Webster had offered to put a shutter along the counter, shutting off the florist section entirely, but this, Mr Shanaghan held, was not sufficient. If both shops closed, of course, no objection would be made to the business arrangement. Dr. Bamford said that Mrs Webster had-carried on the florist business, for ten years, running it quite separate from her husband's, and he contended that it really came under a similar category as a bookstall, the stock-in-trade of which might be closed up, although the stall was an open one. In any case, lie contended that the prosecution should have been against Mrs Webster and not the husband, who was at perfect liberty, under the Act, to carry on his business. Mr Kettle remarked that there seemed to be no provision in the Act for penalising a person that allowed another to carry on a business in his premises. He decided to visit the shop in question, and meantime reserved his judgment.