Lights Out

Press, Volume LXXVIII, Issue 23586, 13 March 1942, Page 4

Lights Out

It is undeniable that the Dominion Lighting Controller and those to whom his authority and powers are delegated have exercised a great deal of patience in their efforts to see that the provisions of the Lighting Restrictions Emergency Regulations are understood and that orders issued under them are efficiently carried out. They are entitled to full co-operation and have earned the right to expect it. More than’ that, they may well conclude that the time has arrived when compulsion must be sharply applied, where orders are not obeyed and warnings arc ignored; and the regulations provide for penalties—imprisonment up to three months, or fines up to £SO and further fines, for a continuing offence, up to £lO a day—heavy enough to bring the most foolish or the most obstinate offender to his senses. But without qualifying the effect of these statements, it may be suggested that a mistake has been made in Christchurch, where, as the Mayor announced last week, it has been decided to disconnect the electric lights of some householders. The Chief Lighting Warden, in a statement printed yesterday, said that 81 residences would be disconnected for a week. Both the Mayor and the Chief Lighting Warden made it clear that this action was being taken to penalise offences against the regulations during the last bMck-out trial. There are two objections. The first is that the penalty involves quite incalculable risks —to safety, health, even life. It does not, as the Mayor said it would, “fit the crime,” because it is as likely as not to work out with very uneven severity, causing only minor inconvenience in one house and grave mishap in the next. Such risks should not be taken until they must be. The process of prosecution will not work as fast as a policeman and a registered wireman at the switch board; but it does not

work blindly. The second objection is that the regulations do not appear to provide for disconnexion as a penalty. They provide for it, certainly, as one of the means by which the Controller and his, deputies may carry out their general function, “ to “ prevent .or regulate the display of “lights, so far as may be necessary “ or expedient in the interests of the “public safety”; but authority to carry out and to enforce the regulations cannot be understood to include authority to judge and punish offences against the regulations, or to exceed Regulation 11, which deals with offences and penalties. The Chief Lighting Warden and the Mayor, as Chief Warden, would be wise to reconsider the position.