Car Dealers’ Complaint On Stores Board Sales

Press, Volume C, Issue 29643, 13 October 1961, Page 12

Car Dealers’ Complaint On Stores Board Sales

On Saturday, September 16, the Government Stores Board auctioned 36 trucks, eight utility vehicles, and 20 cars. Asked yesterday why a Government department had preferential treatment in Saturday trading, the district superintendent of the Labour Department (Mr C. P. Collins) said that the Crown was not bound by the Shops and Offices Act. “I have not for some years had my attention drawn to the fact that any Government department is auctioning goods on a Saturday. However, I would be surprised to find a Government depart-

ment selling goods when private traders W€re not legally entitled to do so,” said Mr Collins. Complaints that motorvehicle dealers are not *“«wea to auction cars on Saturdays because they would contravene the Shops and Offices Act, 1955, but the Government Stores Board is allowed to conduct Saturday auctions have been made by Christchurch motor dealers. A motor firm which is winding up its business advertised in “The Press” on October 7, that it would hold an auction sale on October 14. It was subsequently advised by the Labour Department that it could not hold the sale, as it was illegal. On October 7 an advertisement appeared in “The Press” that a firm of auctioneers would hold a sale of surplus clothing tomorrow on behalf of the Government Stores Board. Mr Collins added that in any case the Government Stores Board did not come under the jurisdiction of the Labour Department. Mr A. Grigor, who represents the Government Stores Board in Christchurch, said it had been the policy of the Treasury, which authorised the auctions, to have auctions on a Saturday.