MAN FINED £200

Evening Post, Volume CXXXVI, Issue 4, 5 July 1943, Page 3

MAN FINED £200

ILLEGAL TRADING

RATIONED GOODS

P.A. AUCKLAND, This Day. A fine of £100 on each of two charges was imposed at Paeroa today by the Magistrate, Mr. W. H. Freeman, on Henry Robertson Bush, farmer and former Clerk of the Court, who had admitted three charges of illegal trading within the meaning of the Rationing Emergency Regulations. The case was heard at Paeroa on June 10, when the Magistrate recorded convictions and reserved the question of penalty. The Magistrate said today that Bush was charged on three informations with selling rationed goods, mainly sheets, pillow slips, etc., without coul pons. Facts given by the police showed that the defendant had been carrying on the sale of rationed and other goods from a remote country farmhouse on the Hauraki Plains. The farm was owned by the defendant and conducted by share milkers named Madgwick. Mrs. Madgwick conducted the sales at the house, which was described as little more than a shack, and the defendant took full responsibility for the transactions. Mrs. Madgwick received no benefit from the operations. Two policewomen made | purchases without coupons being tendered or asked for, and Detective-Ser-geant Murray also made a purchase without a coupon. The police later searched the premises and seized material, consisting of many rolls of cloth, valued at £200. The defendant refused to disclose the origin of the goods. After referring to the reason for -the introduction of rationing, the Magistrate said the failure of the vendors to collect coupons was a most serious matter calling for a severe penalty. Quite obviously the defendant did not desire to involve others. "It seems to me the police have by pure chance stumbled across a link in a very undesirable chain of black marketing," said the Magistrate. It was a case of the defendant deliberately setting out to flout the law and exploiting conditions arising out of the war. It seemed very desirable in wartime that regulations should be tightened up to pro-! vide for the confiscation of goods where I persons were found in possession of rationed goods and could give no satisfactory explanation of how +hey came by them. This would go a long way I towards stopping black marketing. ; "Maximum penalties are seldom if ever ! inflicted except in extreme cases," said the Magistrate. "I think these are extreme cases. The fine will be £100 on each of two informations, with costs, and on the third information the defendant is ordered to pay costs only."