INQUIRY INTO ELECTION

Press, Volume LXXXIX, Issue 27213, 3 December 1953, Page 13

INQUIRY INTO ELECTION

Nomination Of Buller Candidate Questioned

“PAPER MIGHT BE FORGERY ” (From Our Own Reporter) WESTPORT, December 2. Explaining nis reason for asking that certain witnesses whom he had subpoenaed to attend the magisterial inquiry into the conduct of the election for the Charleston riding in the Buller County Council elections on October 31 should be ordered out of the Court, Mr D. J. Sullivan, who appeared for the petitioners against the return of John Neil Mouat, said today that if the petition was upheld Mouat’s nomination paper might well be described as a forgery. Mr C. C. Marsack, S.M., is the presiding Magistrate. Mr H. A. E. Maitland is appearing for the Returning Officer (C. F. Schadick), and Mr A. A. Craig for Mouat. The petitioners are John Henry Powell, of Westport, who was defeated by Mouat at the election; J. Cairns, of Pahuatane; Andrew Hunter, of Pahautane: Arthur Martindale, of Porari; Percy Bridges, of Punakaiki; W. R. Riley, of Punakaiki; and S. F. Butterworth, of Tiromoana. The grounds for the petition are:— That the nomination of William J. Cairns for the Charleston riding was wrongly rejected as the paper uas correctly signed and was in order, that the Returning Officer failed in his duty in not returning the nomination paper to Cairns in reasonable time to enable him to make any alterations which were considered necessary, and that John Neil Mouat’s nomination paper was irregular and should have been disallowed. When Mr Sullivan asked that three witnesses. William Hampton, Edward Bruce Currie, and Arthur Mitchell, should be ordered out of the Court, the Magistrate said that if they were debarred it should apply to all other witnesses, and he ordered that all should leave. Mr Sullivan said that he did not intend to pursue the grounds that the Returning Officer had failed in his duty in not returning his nomination paper to Cairns in reasonable time to make the alterations which he considered necessary. He would say that the Returning Officer was wrong, though, in not accepting the paper. Regarding Mouat’s paper, counsel claimed that the successful candidate had not signed it and that the signatures of some of his nominees were not those of the electors. He said that the reason why Cairns’s paper was refused was that nominees had signed at the top instead of the bottom. Returning Officer’s Evidence C. F. Schadick, engineer-clerk to the Buller County Council and Returning Officer for the elections, produced details of the rolls and nomination papers. He said that when Hampton signed Mouat’s nomination paper he was actually on the roll of electors, but when the supplementary roll was taken out it was found that he was not eligible. He had heard talk of Manderson’s signature being questioned. but there were two other regular signatures on Mouat’s paper, which were sufficient to put it in order. Schadick said that Cairns’s nominees had signed at the top instead of the bottom. The cheque for his deposit was drawn on a Greymout.h bank. On Cairns’s nomination paper for the previous election the signatures had been on the bottom. Mr Craig said that the validity of a cheque drawn on a Greymouth bank in payment of the deposit would be challenged. Evidence was given by Hampton. Currie, and Mitchell in which they strongly affirmed that they had twice signed Mouat’s nomination paper and of having seen Mouat’s name there. It was stated that attempts to subpoena , Gordon Manderson. of Punakaiki, who had also nominated Mouat. had been unsuccessful. He was said to be away in Christchurch with his address unknown. Long evidence was given,by Samuel

Hall, a handwriting expert, of Wellington, indicating that one of the two signatures of Mouat’s three nominees, Hampton, Currie, and Mitchell, were not identical with others on the nomination paper and on receipts on the subpoena sheet for expenses. He also said that other signatures of John N. Mouat were not identical with that on his nomination paper, and that four signatures on the paper, those of Mouat. Hampton, Currie, and Mitchell, had similar general characteristics to the writing of Thomas Neil Mouat, the father of John N. Mouat, on other documents produced in Court. Witness said that one of the signatures of the four men. J. N. Mouat, Hampton, Currie, and Mitchell, seemed to have been made by the one person. The inquiry will continue tomorrow.