S.M. Holds Department’s Honey Tests Not Reliable

Press, Volume CII, Issue 30235, 13 September 1963, Page 12

S.M. Holds Department’s Honey Tests Not Reliable

(New Zealand Press Association)

AUCKLAND, September 12.

Samples of honey from Springfield Apiaries, Ltd., Rotorua, had caused no ill-effects whatever in children and adults, and the initial tests made by the Health Department on the honey could not be regarded as completely reliable, Mr L. G. H. Sinclair, S.M., was told in the Magistrate’s Court at Auckland today.

The Court was hearing an application by the company to have a Health Department seizure order of £22,000 worth of the company’s honey put aside and the honey restored. The Health Department had alleged that the honey was injurious to health.

After hearing a joint statement from counsel for the company, Mr J. E. Dillon, and for the department. Mr C. M. Nicholson, the Magistrate ordered that the honey be returned to the company. He then adjourned the hearing sine die. The Health Department, said the statement, did not now oppose the seizure being disallowed. The statement said that a total of £22,000 in stocks and containers was in issue in the proceedings. The seizure also involved the cancellation of negotiations which were being completed by the

company for substantial overseas contracts.

It had now been found that the method of testing, initially relied upon by the Health Department, could not be regarded as being completely reliable. The statement said samples at the honey had now been consumed in appreciable quantities by adults and children and • had been found to cause no ill-effects. The statement concluded: ‘ ‘Therefore, all this honey can now be regarded as free from any injurious agent previously suspected by the Health Department.”