APPLICATIONS FOR RILIEE

Press, Volume LXXIII, Issue 22003, 29 January 1937, Page 16

APPLICATIONS FOR RILIEE

REHABILITATION 01?

MORTGAGORS

STATEMENT BY ATTORNEY-

GENERAL

Legal offices in Christchurch, and in ether districts in the Dominion, in all probability, have been working at increased pressure recently owing to the rush of applications for relief under the Mortgagors' and Lessees' Rehabilitation Act. Up to yesterday morning, it was understood that all applications for relief had to be accompanied by a lull and verified statement of creditors and debtors, and also a statement of assets and liabilities. Yesterday, however, the secretary of the Canterbury District Law Society received a telegram from the Attor-ney-General, the Hon. H. G. R. Mason, in which it was stated that applications might be filed without the statements of assets and liabilities, and that although he was in no way empowerea to give an interpretation of the act, he thought that it would be much better to file an application without a statement than not to file any application at all before January 31, the closing 'in the act, provision was made for the filing of amended statements, as the latest information that solicitors could get in many cases were balancesheets up to March or May last year, bo that by the time that the application was ready for hearing the statements ■would be leng out of date and practically useless.

Some Lcgul Opinion

"The Attorney-General's telegram seems to set out three things," said a solicitor yesterday. "First, it allows applications to be filed without statements of creditors and debtors or of assets and liabilities; second, it practically promises that the court and commissions will probably stretch a point as far as possible in favour of late applications; and; third, it seems to give a pretty good indication that if anyone takes advantage of a technicality and is successful, the law will be altered at the first possible opportunity." Another opinion was that it was a correct and careful statement, and practically crystallised the present position. The information in the statements would be much fuller at the hearing of the application. Some solicitors had already adopted the practice of filing applications and risking the consequences of not showing the full and certified statements.

Attorney-General's Message

Mr Mason's telegram read as follows: "Referring to your letter of January 18 • to the secretary of the New Zealand Law Society—Mortgagors and Lessees Rehabilitation Act—all registrars will ..accept applications lodged with or •without statements and will accept statements later; and where the opposing party raises no objection, that will dispose of the point. - "If an objection is raised, but the applicant has used every reasonable endeavour, then I am convinced that the applicant may rely that the commissions and the court will recognise the remedial nature of the legislation, "both in their interpretation of the act and in their use of any powers they may have; but whether or not this will enable applications so filed to be held good in the case of a dispute, is a question which solicitors themselves are in as good a position to answer as I am. I have no more power to give authoritative interpretations of the act than I have to alter what is part of the statute itself.

"If an application be lodged this month, however incomplete, solicitors will recognise as readily as I that it ■will constitute a very considerable element in any argument asking for the month's grace which the court is empowered to give, and that it is therefore vastly better to lodge before January 31 an incomplete application than none at all."