Act may have to be amended

Press, Volume CXV, Issue 34021, 9 December 1975, Page 19

Act may have to be amended

(N.Z. Press Association) WELLINGTON. Amendments would be needed to the Motor Vehicle Dealers Act because of the speed at which it was pushed through Parliament, the Motor Vehicle Dealers Institute president, Mr J. R. Nicholls said. The act contained errors which would require an amending act to correct them. He told the institute’s inaugural meeting in Wellington he was disappointed in having put so much effort into getting the bill correct only to have amendments introduced and rushed through Parliament in one week. “It is not too serious but it is the result of an over-full, badly managed legislative programme ending in a last minute flurry of activity,” he said. “I hope the new Government will take due note of electorate dissatisfaction on this matter. “I must say that my experience of the legislative machine during the last two years has left me highly critical of the process by which our laws are enacted.” Mr Nicholls said he was also concerned about the trend of increasing Government interference in the affairs of motor vehicle dealers.

He said there was an urgent need among retail dealers for greater personal concern about the erosion of individual freedom of action. Mr Nicholls said the motor industry was not a secondclass one under suspicion or attack but was at the forefront of New Zealand’s progress. ' He warned the dealers that they could not continue to sell new cars in quantity unless second-hand cars could also be sold in quantity.