GALLERY NOTES

Manawatu Standard, Volume XLVI, Issue 199, 23 July 1926, Page 7

GALLERY NOTES

COMING LEGISLATION, THE DAIRY INDUSTRY, AN AMENDING BILL, fßy Telegraph.—Special to Standard.] WELLINGTON, . July 22. Tho most important provision of the Dairy Industry Amendment Bill, inthroduced into Parliament by the Minister of Agriculture (Hon. 0. J. Hawken) is one empowering tho Govern’ment to make regulations requiring the owners of dairy factories to pay different prices for different grades of milk or cream supplied. It also enables the Government to fix the minimum amounts by which the prices shall vary for tlio different grades. The regulations in regard, to the grading ot cream may provide for a classification of cream according to tho percentage Of butter-fat therein, and payment may be required to bo made in accordance with a scale based on such classification. . . ... The existing provisions prohibiting the export of butter containing more than 16 per cent, of water are amended by adding the words “or less than 80 per centum of butter-fat.” It is laid down that no dairy company is to be registered under the Companies Act under any name which includes the word “co-operative,” or any word of like significance, unless it is enttiled to be registered as a co-operative dairy company under part 3 of the Dairy Industry Act, 1908. Tho registrar of companies may take steps to remedy any existing errors in this respect by compelling companies to alter their names. Other sections relate to the apportionment of compulsory expenditure between the landlord and the tenant of a dairy farm, tho cooling of milk, and the prevention of contamination of stored dairy produce.

GUARDIANSHIP OF INFANTS. The existing provisions in the Infants Act for the Guardianship of Infants are supplemented and in part superseded by a new measure which has been introduced into Parliament. The Bill is similar to a recent English Act and is entitled the Guardianship of Infants Bill. It is proposed to be made effective on January 1 next. The basic principle is laid down that in all court proceedings relating to the custody or upbringing of an infant, or to the administration of property held in trust for an infant, the welfare of the infant is to be the first and paramount consideration. The court shall not take into consideration whether from any other point of view the claim of the father or the mother is superior, or whether the father has an advantage under any right at common law possessed by him. Both parents are placed on an equality in respect to applications to a court. On the death of either parent the other, if surviving, shall, subject tq the provisions of trie bill, bo guardian of the infant either alone or jointly with any guardian appointed by the deceased parent by deed or will. When no such appointment has been made, or if the appointee or appointees are dead or unwilling to act, the Magistrate’s Court may, if it thinks fit, appoint a guardian to act jointly with the surviving parent. The court is vested with wide powers in dealing with applications respecting guardianship and may make orders respecting access to the infant by the surviving parent and the payment of maintenance money to the guardian by a surviving parent who has been deprived of custody of the infant. The court may also decide matters in dispute when joint guardians fail to agree. The jurisdiction of the Magistrate’s Court is not to extend to applications respecting any infant 16 years of age and over who is not physically or mentally incapable of selfsupport or to applications involving the administration or application of trust property or the income therefrom.

New provisions are made regarding consents to the marriage of an infant and attached to tho bill is a rather elaborate schedule setting forth the persons whose consent is required if both parents are alive, or if one or other is dead, if a guardian has or has not been appointed by a deceased parent, if the. parents are divorced or separated, if one has deserted the other, or if both parents have been deprived of custody by order of the court. The schedule also includes illegitimate infants and gives the fathers of such infants no standing in 'the matter. Nothing in the bill is to limit the powers of Children’s Courts under the Child Welfare Act or those of the superintendent of child welfare in respect of children committed to his care undfr the latter Act.

RENT RESTRICTION BILL. The Rent Restriction Bill was introduced in the House to-day. The purpose of the bill is twofold; it provides in the first place that tho existing Jaw as to the restriction of rent shall continue in force without alteration until the Ist March, 1927, and in the second place it provides that after that date the law will apply subject to certain material alterations, only to those dwelling houses to which it is made applicable by order of a stipendiary magistrate made on the application of the tenant. On any such application the magistrate is required by the provisions of the bill to consider tho competing hardships of the landlord and tenant and may make an order in favour of the tenant only if he is satisfied that tho refusal of the application would cause greater hardship to the tenant than the grant of the application would cause to the landlord. Where an order is made as aforesaid in favour of the tenant the rent restriction legislation will continue to apply to the dwelling house to which the order relates subject to a material alteration as to the amount* of the standard rent. In this connection it is proposed to repeal the provisions which fix the standard rent by reference to tho pre-war conditions and to substitute a provision fixing the annual standard rent at an amount equal to a clear seven per cent, of the present capital value after making provision for outgoings in respect of rates, insurances and repairs, and for the inevitable depreciation. The bill further provides that the legislation shall he deemed to be repealed on the Ist January, 1928.

BELLAMY’S. . A vote is at present being, taken to decide whether liquor should be sold in Bellamy’s or not. The ballot is taken under section 270 of the Legislature Act, 1909, which provides that a poll of members of Parliament is to be taken in the first session of each new Parliament on the fourth Tuesday” after the Address-in-Reply has been determined by the House of Representatives on the question: “Shall liquor be sold within the precincts of the Parliamentary Buildings during

the remainder of the present Parliament.” The poll is taken by the clerk of each House. Members vote “Aye” and “No” and the issue is taken oil a bare majority. If there is an equality of votes the clerk of the Legislative Council will decide the issue by his casting vote. The voting is by open voting. On the last occasion on which a poll was taken there was a considerable majority in favour of the sale of liquor in Bellamy’s, but on the previous occasion there was a majority of only one in favour of the sale of liquor. It is not generally expected that the poll on the present occasion will be in favour of prohibition, for though the present Parliament is a very temperate one members generally regard Parliament House as a club and not as a battleground on which tho issue of liquor or no liquor should be fought.