THE UNIVERSITY CASE.

Auckland Star, Volume XLIX, Issue 51, 28 February 1918, Page 4

THE UNIVERSITY CASE.

CLAIM FOR COMPENSATION. . COURT AWARDS £17,022. Decision was deliveree: at the Supreme Court this morning in the case in which the Auckland University College Council claimed a sum of £20,289 1/ from the Auckland City Council as compensation for the taking of the University land and buildings in connection with the Anxac Avenue formation. The case wag heard by Mr. Justice Cooper, with Mesßrs. W. B. Leyland and H. C. Tewsley as assessors. Mr. Prendergast appeared for the claimant, and Mr. Reed BLO, and Mr. Stanton for the respondent. The total amount awarded under the judgment is £17,022. The total amount claimed by the claimant was based on irve separate estimates:—(l) For the value of the land taken, exclusive of the buildings and improvements thereon, £10,572; (2) the buildings and the improvements on the land taken, £5,219 10/; (3) damage to and loss of furnishings and cost of removal to Grammar School premises £748 10/; (4) estimated cost of fitting up temporary premises in Symonds Street, Auckland, £1417 14/; (5) part of cost of reinstatement, being part of j cost of premises at corner of Svmonds Street and Alfred Street, £2331 7/. The sum of £10,572, the value of the land taken, exclusive of the buildings and improvements thereon, had been agreed upon by the parties, and the respondent has filed under the provisions of the Public Works Act an offer to pay £14,572 in settlement of total claim. In respect of the value of the bufldings, the Court did not accept the estimate of either party, but determined that the amount to which the claimant was entitled on this branch of the claim is the sum of £3000. In respect of the third branch of the claim, the Court was of the opinion that the claimant was entitled to a much greater amount than the respondent had suggested. This amount was therefore fixed at £650. The fourth item (the «ost of fitting up the Grammar School, £1,417 I*/) was allowed, and £1300, which the Court thought a fair sum for the alterations in the Grammar School buildings, which were necessarily occasioned by the fact that the claimants had no suitable building to go to upon vacating the buildings taken by the respondent. The fifth item ( £2331 7/). the evidenoe showed was based -upon the difference between the estimated amount of what a contract for the work done on the Choral Hall site would have cost if such a contract had been let before the war, and the amount of the contract entered into in August last, three years after the commencement of the war. The Court could not accept the view put forward by the respondent's counsel that the claimant could have erected on the Grammar School site a temporary building for this department of the University. The Court held that the claimant was entitled to compensation on the basis of what the reasonable cost would be to put the claimant in a position equally advantageous to that from whicH it had been displaced by the respondeat. After carefully considering the evidence adduced by both parties, the Court found that a sum of £1500 was a fair amount to award to the claimant under the flftbThead of its claiim The judgment concluded with thanks to counsel for both parties for the assistance they, had given -to- the €ouirl