DE GAULLE REFUSED SUPPORT BY M.R.P. IMPACT OF HOUSING SHORTAGE ON RAGLAN ELECTION

Evening Star, Issue 26087, 29 April 1947, Page 6

DE GAULLE REFUSED SUPPORT BY M.R.P.

IMPACT OF HOUSING SHORTAGE ON RAGLAN ELECTION

RESIDENTIAL TECHNICALITIES (P.A.) HAMILTON, April 29. That the effect of the housing shortage upoh the place of residence of many electors was a ’new factor which had not concerned . previous electoral courts in considering a ‘person’s temporary absence from an electorate was stressed by Mr T. P, Cleary, for the respondent, continuing his opening address in the Electoral Court this moriimg - Mr Cleary said housing difficulties might force a man to take shelter with friends or relatives outside his normal electorate until he could find another home within the electorate. Or, like thousands of other electors, he might have to seek temporary shelter while awaiting a rehabilitation loan to acquire a new house or farm. Mr Cleary claimed that it was* sufficient to preserve,an elector’s qualification in a given- .electorate if his intention was to leave, as soon as possible, his temporary residence outside that electorate. He quoted the case of a married couple who were obliged to give up their home in Raglan and stay with relatives outside the electorate for four months while building their new home inside the Raglan boundaries. The petitioner had challenged their votes, but it could hardly be suggested that these people could have been prosecuted for failing to register in the eleetprate where they stayed temporarily for four months. If they could not be prosecuted fop that, they could not be said to have lost their qualification for Raglan. The petitioner had also objected, to the vote ' of a man who for' three months was obliged to seek shelter in a transit camp outside (Raglan, although the man’s only desire was to get out of the camp and *back to Raglan, where his home formerly was! It was repugnant to common. sense that in such cases as these the voter should ha,ve forced upon him a qualification for a new district merely because of three months’ temporary residence there when the voter’s paramount desire was to leave the district as soon‘as possible. Mr Cleary said the .construction which the petitioner sought to'placa upon the Electoral Act in> this respect was too narrow and technical, and might lead to some electors^being disfranchised altogether. His- submission, if accepted by the court, would not only lead to the rejection of some of the petitioner’s objections, but; would also mean that some of the objections the respondent had felt it necessary to place on his list would* also fail, said Mr Cleary, but the respondent would prefer to have liis submission accepted, even though some of his objections would fail, along with a number of the petitioner’s.