PROPERTY CLAIM BY WOMEN

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume LXXI, 30 March 1938, Page 4

PROPERTY CLAIM BY WOMEN

APPEARS BEF )RE PRIVY COUNCIL LONDON, 17ih March. The hearing of Miss Noni Horton* petition for leave to appeal to tlie Privy Council was begun to-day. Mis* Horton, whose pieparation of her own case aroused interest throughout Australia. claims that the late Gordon Philip | Jones, grazier, of New South Wale*, beInueatlied her his property in his will. She Isavs that ..he was nu.*e-se» ret ary to Mr Jones for three years until his death in 1961. j She claims that she relinquitdied her I own business interests to take the posi- , (ion on a verbal understanding that Jones i would leave her his fortune. She was I wen-suited by the Supreme Court of New i South Wales., which held that Elizabethan taw laid it down that all conn arts relatj ing to land must be in writing. | Unrepresented by counsel. but suri touiided by piles of documents and books. Miss Horton, who was unawed, began presenting her < a**e to Lord Wright, Lord ; Router and Sir George Rankin. As she began to read her petition from ; ccunsel * desk, Lord Wright interrupted, >a\ing that he had heard that she had been involved in an accident. He ordered that a (hair be brought, and Raid that he was willing :o waive formalities and allow her to speak seated. But Mis* Horton, who fractured two ribs when she became jammed in a heavy door in Australia House, sail that she had many authorities and many refer cnees to consul!, and she preferred to stand. After listening to her further, the Privy jCtuneil reserved judgment.