HOTEL LICENSES.

Press, Volume LXV, Issue 19734, 26 September 1929, Page 13

HOTEL LICENSES.

ASHBURTON APPLICATIONS TEST CASE TO BE DECIDED. The question of granting licenses to lotels :i* Anhburton will be decided by the Court of Appeal at it* present •itting in Wellington, and it is anticipated that the caao will be heard Within the next two weeks.

The application for a license for the flunereet Hotel by Joseph Scales has l*eo mad«j the subject of a test case, •nd the application for writs of man«i»mus and i-crtioruri have been removed to the Court of Appeal for determination. The application was first lodged in the Supreme Court at Chrtstchurch. but owina to the importance of the question the interested parties consented to ite removal to the higher Court, so that the decision of • lull Bench of Judges could be obtained. The point for consideration by the Appeal Court is whether the Mid-Can-terbury Licensinsi Committee has power to grant applications for licensee, and if eo the plaintiff, Joseph fktlm, aska for an order compelling the committee to hear and dispose of hi* application on its merits. If the Court decide* that the Licensing Committee h«* power u» grant licenses, then it wilt reat with the committee U consider each of the four applications from Ashburton hotelkeepers lodged at the annual meeting at Leeetou, last June, on it* merits. The applicants were: Joseph Scales, Somerset Haiti: Charles Benjamin Gass, Commercial Hotel; Patrick Devane DeTn««*t Hotel; John Herman. Grand Central Hotel. , „ The deewwn *f the Appeal Cwirt •ill hare no bearing on the application ©f David Daily for a license at Wi tutor, which was refueed by the Tetnnka Licensing Committee in J"i"». hut it will affect the application of K. C. Weed for a license for the Mt. Anmata Hotel, which was aNo made to Wit Temuka Committee and adjourned. The decision is also beinji awaited with interest in the Central Otago licensing Tli-ttrirt. where a similar position has arisen in respect to a number of hotels in and around Law-fi-nce.

In the teat case. Joseph Scales is Wing reprinted by Messra Duncan Cotterill, and Co.. and the defendant, the Mkl-C.mterhnry ttc*-,,M(,i; Committee, by -Messrs OrWl an.l CnnrU*. ,\«dihiirt<>".