Appeal Dismissed On Wine Licence

Press, Volume CII, Issue 30110, 19 April 1963, Page 5

Appeal Dismissed On Wine Licence

(From Our Own Reporter)

WELLINGTON, April 18.

An appeal against a decision of the Canterbury Licensing Committee granting a wine reseller’s licence to Montana Wines, Ltd., for premises at 368 Colombo street, was dismissed by the Licensing Control Commission in a judgment issued today. The appeal was by Bernard Wallace Lawrence, licensee of the’Club Hotel. Mr G. T. Mahon appeared for Montana Wines, and Mr J. G. Leggat for Lawrence.

The evidence was that the company produced 25,000 gallons of wines annually at Titirangi. At the hearing before the committee, objection to the grant of a wine reseller’s licence was taken by R. G. F. Kingscoate (of Fletcher Humphreys, Ltd., wine and spirit merchants). Lawrence, and Alan Frederick Ibbotson, licensee of the Sandridge Hotel, The committee granted the licence to Montana Wines. Ltd., and Lawrence and Ibbotson appealed to the commission.

At the hearing of the appeal, counsel for Ibbotson informed the commission that his client wished to withdraw his appeal, and this was agreed to. “A wine reseller’s licence authorises sales of New Zealand wine in single bottles, and we are unable to see how it could be argued that a licence to sell New Zealand wine in single bottles is not necessary in any neighbourhood merely because a wholesaler is willing and able to sell in 12-bottle lots, his statutory minimum,” says the commission’s judgment. Phe legislation has said that New Zealand wine will be available through wine resellers in single bottle lots, and we would be making the law instead of interpreting it, if in effect we told the public to purchase New Zealand

wine from a wholesaler in 12-bottle lots. . . , “When the committee decided to grant this application, in effect, it decided that the respondent company was entitled in the circumstances of this case to establish an outlet designed to help create and meet a demand for its wines.

“Looking at all the circumstances of the case we are not convinced that the committee was wrong, and the appeal is therefore dismissed, and the decision of the committee is confirmed. “We think we should add that it should not be assumed that we accept the view that every wine maker is entitled by virtue of section 7 (9) of the Licensing Amendment Act, 1960. to a wine reseller’s licence for the purpose bf promoting the sale of his own wines. Each case must be decided on its merits,” the judgment said.