Trust Commissioner’s Rules.

Gisborne Standard and Cook County Gazette, Volume II, Issue 222, 15 November 1888, Page 3

Trust Commissioner’s Rules.

The following are the rules recently gazetted under the Native Lands Frauds Prevention Act and amendment thereto :— 1. The rules made by the Order in Council of the fourteenth day of February, one thousand eight hundred and eighty-two, are hereby revoked, and the Schedule to the said rules is hereby also revoked. 2. An application for the certificate of a Commissioner shall be in the Form (A) or (B) in the Schedule hereto, and shall be signed by or on behalf of the person requiring such certificate. 3. A Commissioner shall not be required to hold an inquiry unless payment of his reasonable expenses in attending at the place to be appointed for the inquiry, together with the reasonable expenses of any public officer whose attendance thereat he shall deem necessary, be first secured to his satisfaction.

4. A Commissioner shall appoint a time and place for the commencement of each inquiry, and shall cause notice thereof to be given in such manner and to such persons as he may deem fit, either by way of personal service, advertisement in the Gazette or Kahiti, or otherwise howsoever ; and he may from time to time adjourn any. inquiry, and continue the same either at the place at which it was commenced, or at any other place to be by him appointed. 5. A summons to a witness may be in the form (C), or to the like effect. 6. If a Commissioner decide to grant a certificate, he shall not sign the same until the expiration of seven days after such decision.

7. A person aggrieved by the decision of a Commissions?to grant or to refuse a certificate may, within seven days after such decision, deliver in writing to such Commissioner a notice of his intention to appeal, stating the grounds of dissatisfaction with such decision. If such notice be so delivered, the Commissioner shall not indorse or sign a certificate in pursuance of such decision pending the appeal, 8 Where the decision of a Commissioner is impugned in point of law only, the appeal shall be in the form of a case approved of by the Commissioner. 9. A draft case shall be presented to the’ Commissioner by the appellant for approval within fourteen days after the giving of the decision appealed against. Parties interested shall be entitled to be heard as to the terms of the case ; but it shall be finally settled by the Commissioner according to his own judgment. The Commissioner shall, as soon as conviently may be, transmit the ease as. settled to the Registrar at the nearest office of the Court in the judicial district within which) the lands affected are situate.

to. If the facts be disputed,'the Commissioner shall report the evidence taken by him, and the appeal shall be by way of rehearing upon such report, with discretionary power in the Court to receive further evidence either by oral examination in Court, by affidavit, or by deposition taken before an Examiner or Commissioner appointed for the purpose.

11. It shall not be lawful for the appellant on the hearing of any appeal, whether on a case stated or by way of rehearing, to set up or argue any ground of appeal which shall not have been stated in the notice of ’appeal, saving always to the Court the right to take notice of objections arising on the facts in evidence. 12. Appeals shall be set down for hearing at the first practicable sitting in Banco. 13. The Court may remit a case for amendment. 14. The Registrar shall forthwith certify the decision or direction of the Court to the Commissioner, who shall act thereupon as may be necessary to give effect thereto. 15. Upon any appeal the Court may make such order as to costs, and the party or paities by whom the same shall be paid, as to it may seem fit: Provided that no Commissioner whose decision may have been appealed from shall be liable to any costs in respect of such appeal. 16. Costs allowed upon appeal may be fixed by the Court, and if not so fixed shall be taxed by the Registrar of the Court as in actions. 17. All orders of the Court may be enforced in like manner as orders of the Court in its ordinary jurisdiction, and all proceedings in the Court not hereby expressly provided for shall be governed, as nearly as may be, by the ordinary rules and practice of the Court. 18. If a Commissioner shall, pending an appeal against his decision, Cease to hold office, his duties and position in relation to the case may be assumed by any other Commissioner appointed for the purpose by the Governor,

19. In these rules “(louif means the Supreme Court qf Sew Zealand, and “judge ” and “Registrar” mean Respectively a Judge and Registrar or Deputy Registrar of (he Court. [aCIIEDULE J