SALE OF A.P.C. TABLETS

Press, Volume LXXXVII, Issue 26517, 4 September 1951, Page 5

SALE OF A.P.C. TABLETS

CONVICTION UPHELD BY COURT OF APPEAL (New Zealand Press Association) WELLINGTON, September 3. The Court of Appeal this afternoon delivered judgment on the appeal of Woolworths (New Zealand), Ltd., and J. A. Hazelwood and Company, Ltd., against their conviction by Mr J. S. Hanna, S.M., at Wellington on September 8, 1950, for an offence against the Pharmacy Act, 1939. The companies had been charged upon an information laid by the Registrar of the Pharmacy Board with selling a drug, Vincent’s A.P.C. tablets, to which the Pharmacy Act, 1939, applied. The case had been removed from the Supreme Court to the, Court of Appeal for argument.. ' 1 The companies’ appeal was based on the ground that A.P.C. tablets are a proprietary medicine, and so exempted from the provisions of the act. The Court, in a majority judgment by Mr Justice Stanton and Mr .Justice Hay, held that the tablets did not come within the scope of a proprietary medicine as defined by the act, ana dismissed the appeal. Costs were allowed to the respondent. Mr Justice Adams delivered a dissenting judgment. Mr Harding, for the appellants, moved for conditional leave to appeal to the Privy Council. The motion was held over for further consideration by the Court.