CLOSING HOUR FOR GROCERS.

Dominion, Volume 4, Issue 1243, 27 September 1911, Page 6

CLOSING HOUR FOR GROCERS.

—: $ RIVAL PETITIONS TO COUNCIL. A COMPLICATED POSITION. The City Council have been asked to consider petitions lately from' grocers and shopkeepers who sell groceries, asking on the 0110 hand that, the closing hour 1» fixed at six o'clock, and on the other that things bo allowed to go on ns they are. A petition for early closing, and .1 counter petition were considered at last meeting of Hie City Council, and tho council decided to do nothing about them. A new position has since Ikoii created by the presentation of another petition for early closing, and at a special meeting , of tho City Council, held last night, a deputation of small grocers, headed by Mr. J. 11. Burley, appeared to plead their case.

Mr." Burley said tho deputation represented the grocers who were opposed to the lixinif of any hour for closing:. A petition in favour of six o'clock closing had been sent to the cbuncil, and also .1 counter petition. These petitions wero not really before the meeting, but a n«vr position had been forced on the council by the presentation of a fresh petition in favour of parly closing. They considered that early closing would be disastrous to men who wero doing business in a small way. He asked that the council should not decide the question without allowing his sido to marshal foress and obtain signatories to a petition against the proposed regulation for six o'clock closing. The Acting-Mayor said it appeared to him that as the first petition had been advertised, and the second was not, tho members of (he deputation ought to bo allowed time within which to prepare and present another petition. A general discussion followed, as to what the council ought to do in tho matter. Few of the members professed to know what the legal position of the council was, but the bulk of them thought that the council had not any other duty than to grant or refuse the request iu tho petition already received, and in this they must be guided by tho advice of their officers as to whether (lie petition was or wns not signed by a majority of tho shopkeepers affected. Tho Town Clerk (Mr. Palmer) explained that tho petition referred, not to grooera merely, hut to sellers of groceries, and there was no oflicer of tho council who could sny how many sellers of groceries there in the city. Nor could they find this out excopt by making something like a house-to-housn canvass. They would ba met with this difficulty, too— they would first have to decide upon what commodities wero properly considered ns groceries. ITo thought that probably the only reliable procedure to follow would be to allow a counter petition to l>o presented, for the sellers of groceries, knowing that they would l>o affected, ( might bo relied upon to supply the council with tho information required by signing a petition. In the end it was decided to allow tho members of tho deputation until tho next meeting of tho council to prepare a counter petition.