Board Milk Supply Decision Upheld

Press, Volume CIII, Issue 30630, 22 December 1964, Page 16

Board Milk Supply Decision Upheld

(New Zealand Press Association)

AUCKLAND, December 21.

A decision of the Dairy Production and Marketing Board requiring 92 Ruawai farmers to supply their milk to the Ruawai Co-op dairy Company, Ltd., was upheld by Mr Justice Hardie Boys today.

In a 13,000-word reserved judgment, his Honour rejected a motion to have the order quashed and an injunction restraining the board from assessing compensation allegedly payable by the

Northern Wairoa Co-op Dairy Company, Ltd., to the Ruawai company as a result of the board’s zoning of Ruawai suppliers on the Pouto peninsula to Northern Wairoa.

The plaintiffs (all farmers) were James Edward Jeffers, John Gordon Robinson, Colin Edward Pearce, Bertram Erie Dreadon, and 88 others.

They had named the board as first defendant, the Ruawai company as second defendant, the Northern Wairoa Company as third defendant, the Maungaturoto Co-op. Dairy Company, Ltd., as fourth defendant, and Mr Eric Baker, a Ruawai farmer, on behalf of himself and 125 other dairy farmers, as fifth defendants. Four Grounds

The judgment recalls the history of milk zoning in the area and relates events leading to the zoning decision objected to. Four grounds had been advanced by the plaintiffs—that the board had a financial interest in the application, that the board had no authority to make a zoning order, that if it had power to zone, it was subject to certain regulations as yet not made and fourthly, that the board had delegated its powers to a committee.

The judgment, after considering submissions, rejected the grounds and held that the board was acting within its power.