CURRENT TOPICS.

Northern Advocate, 8 September 1913, Page 4

CURRENT TOPICS.

A CASE TO BE RE-HEARD.

A re-hearing has been ordered by the Government into the causes which led to the loss of the steamer Devon at Pencarrow Head. The circumstances are rather unusual. When the vessel was at Auckland a Captain Black wrote to the master of the Devon offering his services as coastal pilot to Wellington at a fee of £21. The offer was declined. On the trip to Wellington the vessel was lost, and Captain Black was appointed by the Minister for Marine to be one of the Court of Inquiry. The judgment of the Court was entirely against the captain of the Devon, and at first his application for a re-hearing was refused by the Minister. The peculiar position one of the assessors occupied was, however, rather widely commented upon, and the result was that the Minister re-considered his previous decision. This really seems to have been the only course open to him, and it is not necessary to entertain any misgivings as to the bona fides of Captain Black as an assessor in order to see that his appointment, all things considered, was a very unwise One indeed. That a shipmaster should be tried by someone whose services he had declined, scarcely conforms with the commonly accepted theories as to rightful composition of a judicial tribunal.