"OBSOLETE!"

Evening Post, Volume CIII, Issue 152, 30 June 1922, Page 8

"OBSOLETE!"

POISONS ACT ATTACKED

SEQUEL TO RECENT SUICIDE

CHEMIST AND ASSISTANT FINED

The provisions of the Poisons Act were attacked by Mr. 0. C. Mazengaa-b at the Magistrate's Court this morning, wfo,en he was appearing for a chemist and his assistant, who were charged with offences under th-e Act. Robert Johnston, who has a. chemist's business in Cuba-street, was charged with selling poison to a person unknown to him, and failing to note the date of sale and name and address of purchaser. The assistant, Eric Hooper Bias, was sdnrWly charged, and, in addition, was charged with selling poison, not being a. person registered under the Poisons Act. Mr. F. K. Hunt, S.M., was on the Bench, and Sub-Inspector ■ M'Namaia appeared for the police. Sub-Inspector M'Namara said that Biss was an assistant to Mr. Johnston, a chemist, who was carrying on business in the city. There were two charges against Biss—one under section 10 of the Poisons Act, 1908, and the other under section 11, sub-section 2 of the Act. On 9th March, during the absence from the shop of Mr. Johnston, Biss sold a bottle of poison to a woman, who subsequently went to a private I hotel and committed suicide. Biss had sold the poison without question, and without taking any record of the sale. There had been several similar prosecuI tions in various parts of New Zealand, but' as far as he knew., this was the first in Wellington. "WORST STATUTE OF ITS KIND." Mr. Mazengarb said that without a doubt the Poisons Act was the worst statute of its kind in the British Em-. pire. The law was hopelessly out of date, having been passed in 1871, and [ during .that period'of fifty years there had only been two amendments, and these had only served to make the law even more absurd than it was before. Obviously,, the Act was designed to protect the public by prohibiting unregistered persons from selling poisons, and regulating the conditions under whidh registered vendors might sell. It was effective for neither purpose. The Act | allowed many dangerous poisons to be ' sold by any shopkeepers or hawkers, but, by the operation of an ingenious Order-in-Conncil, unnecessarily restricted the sale by qualified and careful chemists of the most common household antiseptics. ■ Mr. _ Hunt: "Shopkeepers can't sell this kind of poison." Mr. Mazengarb : "But they do, sir." Sub-Inspector M'Namara: "You can't buy this poison at a grocer's. They won't .fell it. Your Worship may remember a number of cases in Auckland some time ago, when a raid was made on grocers. Since then, grocers have not sold this poison." "A TRIVIAL OFFENCE." Mr. Mazengarb: "You can buy a hundredweight of anywhere." To show how trivial the present offence was, added Mr. Mazengarb, it was only necessary to refer to some of the more deadly and dangerous poisons that might be sold by anyone without restriction and without asking any questions of the purchaser. Mr. Hunt: "I took the inquest on that giri. She went to the chemist, bought a bottle of poison, and drank half of it." By an Order-in-Councilf gazetted in 1912, continued counsel, the Act was made to apply to "carbolic acid and its homologues containing more than 3 per cent, of those substances." It was through this amendment that the defendants were now being prosecuted. There seemed to have been some doubt as to what the amendment was intended to' cover, and whether the sale of the particular poison was affected thereby. The Health Department was approached by the Pharmaceutical Association, and the Department,admitted that the Older-. ih-Counci]' went'too far and would not be allowed to affect the sale of such ft valuable disinfectant in general use. Since then the poison had been, and still was; freely sold by storekeepers without regard to the Order-in-CouncU. Counsel submitted that Johnston was quite entitled to rely on the undertaking given by the Health Department in 1914, as reported in the issue of "The Chemist :. and Druggist" for July of that year. He had not thought it necessary to burden himself with a restriction ' which the Health Department considered unnecessary, and which was not enforced even against the general storekeeper. It was absurd to inform registered vendors that a regulation would not be enforced and I then prosecute merely because one sale had resulted in a casualty. 4fter the summonses had been issued the Health Department had been communicated with and reminded of its promise; The answer was that it was too late to stop the prosecution, but probably no further i prosecutions would be brought. ' OBJECTION BY FARMING COMMUNITY. Counsel went on, to say that there was nothing about the woman's manner to suggest to the chemist's assistant that it was her intention to end her life, and when the police called the following day the defendants had no hesitation in giving the information on which the present proceedings were founded. In order to rectify the anomaly in the Bill, a Bill was prepared by the Pharmacy Board last year, and .printed copies were submitted to the General Government. The farming community, however, fancied that the intention was to interfere with their purchase of sheep dip and other ■disinfectants. As a result nothing was dome by the Government, and the statute still (remained obsolete and absurd.. The ■entry of a conviction, concluded Mr. Mazengarb^ would only mislead the public into believing that it was being protected, when, in reality it was being fool- j cd. He therefore suggested that the cases should be dismissed as trivial, and that the Court represent the reasons for its judgment in the proper quarter. Mr. Hunt said that his way of protecting the public was to administer the provisions of the Act. It was a chemist's duty to see that he did not sell noxious things. ■ .

Mr. Mazengarb: "Will your Worship take into account the fact that the Health Department ." Mt. Hunt: "No, I -won't take any notice of the Health Department." The assistant is fined £5 and costs, and the employer a like amount."