SCHOOL RATING CASE.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXIV, Issue 19675, 29 June 1927, Page 12

SCHOOL RATING CASE.

ST. CUTHBERT'S COLLEGE

JUDGMENT FOR ROAD BOARD. EXEMPTION NOT PROVIDED. Judgment for plaintiff in the claim by the One Tree Hill Road Board (Mr. Rogerson) against the Auckland Presby terian College for Ladies. Limited (Mr. Stanton), for the recovery of £299 16s 3d as hospital and general rates, was given by Mr. Justice Reed in (lie Supreme Court yesterday. His Honor said the neat point raised by the case was whether the school was entitled to exemption from the payment of rates as being a school "not carried on exclusively for gain or profit." The proprietor of the school was a limited liability company, registered under the Companies Act. In the forefront of its objects was the establishment of a Presbyterian school for girls. It was not, however, confined to girls of that denomination. Shareholders were entitled to dividends out of the profits, it being provided that no dividend should be declared or paid which would' yield to the shareholders a greater rate of interest than 6 per cent., cumulative. Further, it was provided that "the directors may from time to time pay to the members such interim dividends as appear to the directors to be justified by the profits and position of the company." Up to March 31, 1926, the maximum dividend of 6 per cent., as permitted by the Articles of Association, had been regularly paid; for the year ending March 31, 1927, the profits had not warranted the payment of a dividend, but, being cumulative, it remained a charge upon future profits. The Court of Appeal judgment had laid down as a fair test whether a school came within the exemption, the answer to the question, "into whoso coffers would the sum go which is saved by the non-payment of the rates?" There could be but one answer to that question in the present case. Clearly it would go to the shareholders. The scheme of finance was indistinguishable from that of any ordinary commercial concern, with the one exception that the amount of interest was limited. That exception did not affect the position. The spirit of the Act, as interpreted by the various cases, was that no school was entitled to exemption under the section where any part of its profits went to private persons, particularly if those persons were the proprietors and governors of the school. If it were considered expedient that such a school should be exempt it would have to be done hy legislative enactment; it was not, in his opinion, exempted under the present s legislation. Judgment was given for the Road Board for £299 16s 3d, with costs according to scale.