OFFENCES AT ELECTIONS

Evening Post, Volume XCVI, Issue 79, 30 September 1918, Page 8

OFFENCES AT ELECTIONS

_ Under the heading "Offences at Elections," the Legislature Act (section 157) reads as follows :—Every person is liable to a fine not, exceeding £20 who at any election—(a) In any way interferes with any elector, either in the polling booth ■or on his way thereto, with trie intention ■ of influencing him or advising him as to ?his vote; or (b) prints "or distributes. or 'delivers to any person on the day of the; poll, or at any time during the three ■days immediately preceding the poll, any--there being or, purporting to be in imi-' tation of any.ballot paper to be used at the poll and having thereon.Uhe name of the candidates, together with any-.direc-tion or ■indication as to how any person should vote, or'in anyway containing any such direction or indication, or having thereon ■ any:. matter/ likely to influence any vote; or (c) during the hovire in which poll is,being taken makee any public demonstration having reference to the poll by means of living figures, effigies, (paintings, placards, or, other like means. '•'.-■'. ' .

In addition, the' Act provides that hotels in. the district are to be closed within the hours of 12 (noon) and. 7 p.m.-j 1 that the day is to be half-holiday under the' Shops and Offices Act as far as the district is concerned (which means that the usual closing day need not bo observed), 'and that factory employers must give each employee a reasonable opportunity of recording his vote.