AUSTRALIAN CENSORS

Evening Post, Volume CXXIV, Issue 63, 11 September 1937, Page 26

AUSTRALIAN CENSORS

The Federal Government has appointed a permanent Book Censorship Board and an appeal censor.

Sir Robert Garran is the appeal censor, and the members of the board, which replaces the voluntary body that has done tne work since 1933, are Dr, L. H. Allen (chairman), Professo>J. Haydon, and Mr. Kenneth Binns (librarian of the Commonwealth National Library), all of Canberra.

All except Mr. Binns were members of the old board. They are appointed for three years. The censor will tp ceive an honorarium of 100 guineas, and the three members 75 guineas a year each. Under the new arrangements, any importer who is dissatisfied with an opinion given by the board and desires to obtain a review by the appeal censor, will have to deposit 10s, which may be returned if his appeal is upheld. He could still apply to the Courts if he wished.

The wbrk of the new board will be confined to imported literature. Section 52 (c) of the Customs Act prohibits the importation of goods considered "blasphemous, indecent, or obscene." Seditious literature will be dealt with as before, by the AttorneyGeneral's Department.