DOMINION ITEMS

Greymouth Evening Star, 9 July 1931, Page 2

DOMINION ITEMS

[PER PRESS ASSOCIATION.]

SOLICITOR SUSPENDED. WELLINGTON, July 8.

The Court of Appeal to-day delivered its reserved judgment in the case of the New Zealand Law Society v. John Merven Hobin, solicitor, of Whakatane’, the order of the Court being that the practitioner be suspended from practice for a period of three years. Costs of fifteen guineas, together with auditor’s fee, were allowed to the Law Society.

CHEAPER GAS. WELLINGTON, July 9.

The Wellington Gas Company reduces the price of gas by threepence per thousand cubic feet on August 1 as the result of the new agreement with the employees, but the savings in reduction in wages will far from compensate the company for the reduction, it says. The taxation last year was’ £5700 more.

FOREMAN’S SUICIDE. GISBORNE, July S,

A tragic discovery was made at Kaiti Freezing Works this morning, when the body of an employee, George Robert McKenzie, 59 years of age, was found hanging by a rope in the office doorway of the preserver block. The deceased had been employed at the Kaiti Works for the past 25 years, and at the time of the tragedy was preserver foreman. At the inquest a verdict was returned of suicide while in a state of acute mental depression..

POVERTY BAY RAILWAY.

GISBORNE, July 9.

Members of the Railways Board, who arrived overland from Napier last evening, to-day were engaged in an inspection of the portions' of the Gisborne district within easy reach. This morning they journeyed to Tolaga Bay, and this afternoon was spent around Poverty Bay flats. Heavy rain and misty weather have made travelling conditions unpleasant, and somewhat hampered the inspection. The Board returns south, to-morrow.

FOUND SHOT.

CHRISTCHURCH, July 9.

A verdict of suicide while temporarily insane was returned by the Coroner at the resumed inquest on Charles Lyes, who was found dead at Woolston on Saturday, with a bullet wound in his head.

Dr. Pearson, pathologist, said that the wound in the head was unusual, but he considered it quite possible to have been self-inflicted. The inquest had previously been adjourned, as the Coroner had expressed a doubt whether the wound could have been self-inflicted. TRAWLING DISPUTE WELLINGTON, July 9. Steam trawlers, Futurist and Nora Niven, are laid up because of a dispute with the crews over the Sunday bonus of £1 a man for each Sunday spent at sea, which the company discontinued, in view of lower prices and economy.

Au official of N.Z. Fisheries, Ltd., states that since the war the whole of the ship’s company on each trawler have been paid a flat rate bonus of £1 a man for each Sunday and public holiday spent at sea. The Company decided to stop the extra Sunday, but not the holiday payment. It was originally made when only one trawler was operating, and it was not feasible for the vessel to spend all the weekends in port. Now, with two trawlers operating, the necessity for regulating supplies of fish brought into port, usually necessitated one vessel being at sea over the week-end, while the other remains in port.