INTERIM INJUNCTION

Evening Star, Issue 21900, 11 December 1934, Page 11

INTERIM INJUNCTION

FARMER'S COMPLAINT Of SAWDUST IN STREAM APPLICATION TO SUPREME COURT Claiming-.that sawdust and. other refuse discharged into the Tokonui . .-Stream contaminated and polluted, tne :f water and made it 'unfit for watering stock, Robert Hayes Shaw, a Southland farmer, sought an injunction against the Tokonui Saw-milling Company, Limited, before His Honour Mr Justice Kennedy in the Supreme Court to-day. Mr H. L. Cook appeared for the . plaintiff and Mr F. B. Adams tor the defendant. . . , , ~ Mr Cook, in opening the case tor tiie plaintiff, said that’ at this stage he asked for an interlocutory injunction pending the hearing of the case on its merits at ,the_ next session of the Supreme Court in Invercargill, the Tokonui Stream flowed from the sawmill through the farm land of the plaintiff, the water being used extensively by the plaintiff for the watering of his stock. It was contended that the company discharged sawdust and other refuse into the stream and, that a considerable quantity flowed through the plaintiff’s property, so contaminating and polluting the water that it 'could not be used for the watering of the stock. In consequence, the plaintiff had to adopt other means of watering his stock. The plaih- . tiff had been told that a conveyor would be erected to have the sawdust removed without the use of water, biit ho such conveyor had been erected. Counsel thought his learned friend would agree that the plaintiff was entitled to receive water from the stream free from, pollution and that the point at issue was whether there had been pollution. The defence was a definite denial of pollution. Eight of the paddocks in plaintiff’s property depended upon the stream for water for the stock, and_ it was difficult to see how the plaintiff, a small farmer, could carry on in summer time when he was thus deprived of water. Mr Adams, on behalf of the defendant, said that before the stream reached plaintiff’s property a dozen little feeders came in after it left the mill. Therefore any sawdust would influence only a very small portion of the water. Counsel submitted a plan of the stream to His Honour, and said it showed that the quantity of water which might actually . be affected by the percolation . through sawdust was a very small fraction of the total. The stream was one which came from bush and bracken, and it was unlikely that there would be serious pollution from the fact that the water passed through a sawdust dump. It was suggested that there was nothing to warrant the court granting an interim injunction. Any injury- complained , of was not new, as the same method of disposing of the sawdust had been used snee 1920. It was shown by affidavits that no sawdust was now ecaping from the dump. Other affidavits showed that cattle had drunk of the water in the stream between the mill and plaintiff’s property. Counsel suggested that in this case t proper course would have been for-the plaintiff to hai'e brought the results of chemical tests to show that there was pollution in the water. There was no suggestion that a delay in the hearing of the case would cause irreparable injury. There was also no evidence of the “ other refuse ” mentioned by the plaintiff. His Honour said he proposed to say very little about the .facts, because the present application was an application for an interim injunction, and a final injunction might later be applied for, when the matter would bo fully determined upon fuller and more complete evidence. He would say, however, that in view of the lapse of time and of the long continuance of the present method, and in view of the evidence, which he would not refer to now in detail, he did not think that the interim injunction should be directed to pollution. There was sufficient in the evidence hc•fore him to entitle the plaintiff to an interim injunction, but directed only towards restraining the defendant from discharging into the stream sawdust from its sanmill or permitting the discharge inty the stream p| sa,wdust from

the mill. When he' referred to discharge into the stream he referred t discharge of- the water winch “one through the land occupied by the defendant and later passed through the plaintiff’s farm. The interim ordei he was about to make would contain the usual undertaking by .the plaintiff to abide bv any order the court might make as to damages. His made an interim order restmmne discharge of sawdust into plaintift s ground so as to be a nuisance. The restraint would apply until March 20 next yea l or until the court should eailier other wise order. _ , *. The question of costs was resen ca.