MAGISTRATES’ COURTS BILL

Press, Volume LXXXIII, Issue 25243, 23 July 1947, Page 9

MAGISTRATES’ COURTS BILL

JURISDICTION EXTENDED (P.A.) WELLINGTON, July 22. The jurisdiction of magistrates in civil claims is extended from £3OO to £5OO by a clause in the Magistrates’ Courts Bill, a technical measure of 125 clauses, which was introduced in the House of Representatives to-day. The bill was read a second time pro forma and referred to the Statutes Revision Committee. The bill fixes the salary of magistrates at £1250 a year, with prescribed allowances. [Until 1945 magistrates were paid £9OO and £lOOO a year, but in that session the salary of all magistrates was raised to £llOO a year.] The bill states that the number of magistrates shall not at any time exceed 35. The retiring age for magistrates is fixed at 68 years Mr H. G. R. Mason. Minister of Justice, explained that the bill rewrote the law relating to the constitution and jurisdiction of Magistrates’ Courts rather differently from the exposition of it in existing statutes. It set up the courts and did not go so much into procedure, leaving that to be settled by rules, as in the case of the Supreme Court.