QUESTION OF DEPENDENCY

Hawera Star, Volume XLVII, 12 September 1927, Page 7

QUESTION OF DEPENDENCY

WIDOW’S CO AIPENS ATI ON CLAIM. LIVED APART FROAJ HUSBAND. (by TELEGRAPH'TRUSS association.) WELLINGTON, Sept. 9. Last Christmas Day, at the close of his working day, Thomas Patterson, a railway ganger, was thrown from a van which was taking him to his home and killed. The accident occurred between Omoto and GreymoutJi, and admittedly arose in the course of his employment. To-day his widow, Alargaret Patterson, proceeded against His Majesty the King for compensation, and said that she was totally dependent upon her late husband. * The case came before the Arbitration Court.

The case for the Crown was that the claimant had left her husband some months before he left Petone for Nelson. whence he proceeded to the West Coast, and that she. had been living in I’etone with a man named Haywood. The relations between Airs. Patterson and Haywood were nothing to do with the case, hut, they said that .there was not a total dependency. Evidence was given that the title of the property at Petone was registered in the names of Mrs. Patterson and Harold Haywood as tenants' in common in equal shares. Air®. Patterson, in the box, said she had left her husband because of his drunken habits and ill-treatment of her. She received £1 per week and keep from Haywood for acting as his housekeeper, and her husband had sent her £2 each fortnight. The money invested in the house was money which she had saved.

The question came down to one of denendency, said his Honour. Airs. Patterson appeared to have been quite justified in leaving her husband, but she was not totally dependent on him. She might have taken him back had he stopped drinking, but unfortunately he had not.

One could only assume that Patterson’s payments foe hi® son were actually for the wife, and she was entitled to compensation. Patterson was a, man of 60 years, and liisi working life would probably not have been more than five years. They allowed this period or the sum of £250. The court was also satisfied as to the bona fide relationship between Afrs. Patterson and Haywood.