A CASE FOR ENQUIRY.

Evening Post, Volume LXVI, Issue 55, 2 September 1903, Page 4

A CASE FOR ENQUIRY.

A case which has aroused considerable interest in Westport should receive the attention of the Commandant of the Forces. It seems that the captain of a volunteer company, the Westport Artillery, charged a member of the corps named Powell with using insolent language to him, and imposed a fine of 10s. Powell did not pay the fine, and the case was taken into Court and the Stipendiary Magistrate asked to commit him to prison. During the hearing of the case, however, it transpired that Powell had been given no opportunity of defending himself before the fine was imposed, nor had his notice of appeal received proper attention. The Magistrate (Mr. R. S. Hawkins) held that under the circumstances, the regulations having been departed from, he had no power to commit, and he commented on the action of the officer in charge of the district in refusing to submit to his superior officer the appeal of the defendant Powell. These briefly are the facts as disclosed in the Court proceedings. Judging from information at our disposal, however, there is more underlying the trouble than has appeared on the surface. Some time ago there was an examination for noncommissioned officers' certificates, and the captain of the corps was blamed by Powell and others for non-publication of the correct list of passes, an incorrect list somehow finding its way into print. There was also a dispute concerning a contract for supplying the corps with uniforms, Powell and others holding that their captain, who is a tailor, should not continue to hold this contract withoutcompeting for it by public tender. These matters, small as they may appear in themselves, involve questions of principle which are by no means small. An enquiry of a kind has, we believe, been held, but nothing short of a thorough investigation by an impartial person is likely to give satisfaction, or allay the feeling of discontent 'which is said to have arisen. The inteiests of volunteering demand that the matter shall be fully enquired into. On the evidence available, ifc is proved that this volunteer has had a slur placed upon him without being given that opportunity of defending himself provided by the regulations. His case may be that of any other citizen soldier to-morrow unless the head of the Department makes it perfectly plain that these breaches of the regulations are not to be committed with impunity.