JAIL TERMS SHOULD BE COMPULSORY

Dominion, Volume 31, Issue 142, 12 March 1938, Page 13

JAIL TERMS SHOULD BE COMPULSORY

Penalty On Intoxicated Drivers OPINION OF CONFERENCE OF JUSTICES By Telegraph—Press Association. New Plymouth, March 11. The elimination of the option of a fine when a motorist is convicted of intoxication while driving.a car and the compulsory imposition of a term of imprisonment, as well as the cancellation of the driver’s licence, were advocated this morning by the conference of justices of the peace at New Plymouth as the only method of dealing with “the increasing slaughter on the road.” Representations are to be made to the Minister of Transport to have the law amended in this direction. It was also decided that applications for the first licence to drive a 'motor vehicle should be accompanied by a police certificate stating that the applicant was of sober habits and a fit person to be granted a licence. . Despite strong endeavours recently, the toll of “murder” on the road was not reduced, stated Mr. A. 11. Hobbs, Canterbury, who moved a remit urging that the law must be tightened and the offender sent to prison. It was not right that a man with a comfortable bank balance should be able to escape by the payment of a fine. Surely anyone who sat at the wheel of a machine capable of killing should be a proper person to hold that responsibility and not a sufferer from The insidious disease of inability to resist drink. What was wanted, claimed Mr. W. Jacobson, Otago, was uniformity throughout the Dominion. At present no two magistrates or J.P.’s gave the same penalty.

Asking how the police were .io know if people were of sober habits, Mr. J. P. Paterson, Auckland, suggested that the remit should read “and/or imprisonment,” but Mr. Hobbs refused to accept this as the option was already In the law.