HERBALIST OR-CHEMIST

New Zealand Times, Volume LXXI, Issue 4307, 16 March 1901, Page 3

HERBALIST OR-CHEMIST

THE CASE OF RICHARD AYRES. ' JUDGMENT OF MR JUSTICE' EDWARDS. In. the Supreme Court yesterday, Mr Justice Edwards delivered his reserved judgment in the case of Richard Ayres, of Cuba street and Newtown, v. the Pharmaceutical Society of New Zealand, an action for mandamus to register the plaintiff as a pharmaceutical chemist without examination.

Mr Skerrett was for the plaintiff, and Mr Hislop for the defendant society.

His Honor said this was an action for a mandamus to the defendant society to register the plaintiff as a pharmaceutical chemist under the provisions of the Pharmacy Act, 1898, or for such other relief as the Court might think fit. The plaintiff alleged jus the ground of the action that ho was a person who, being of the age of twenty-one years and upwards, after the Ist January, ISSI, and before the Ist January, 1898, kept as owner open shop in the city of Wellington both gs a dispensing and as a 'hom.eoopn.thic ohemist. The plaintiff further alleged that he had compiled with the provisions of sections 28 and 29 pf the Ant of 1898. Ho therefore claimed that he was entitled under, the provisions of subsection 2 of section 27 of the Act of 1898 to he registered as a pharmaceutical chemist without examination. The defendant society denied that the plaintiff kept open shop as alleged' by him, and alleged that the plaintiff’s application was taken into consideration, by them, and that, after requiring pi-oof 'from the plaintiff, and after making further inquiries, they decided that the plaintiff had not established that bo_ had kept open shop as alleged by him. ’ His Honor reviewed the evidence, and said he was satisfied that the plaintiff did not possess the knowledge of experience recjiusit© to enable him to compound prescriptions, and that he could not attempt to do so- without grave danger to the public, and. incidentally, to. himself. He was also satisfied that the plaintiff had not been in the habit of compounding prescriptions. He did- not think that the plaintiff had established that the evidence before the Pharmacy Board was such as to leave the Board nothing upon which to exercise a discretion. The board was, in his Honor’s opinion, wrong iii taking evidence in tiie absence of the plaintiff and not disclosed: to him. It was impossible for him to. say that the evidence before the hoard in support of the plaintiff’s claim was clear and incontrovertible. Further, the evidence satisfied him that the plaintiff did not come within the provision of section 27 of the Act of 1898. In his opinion, it was clear that tho plaintiff had never at any time kept either as owner or manager, open shop ns a dispensing or homoeopathic chemist withhi the meaning of the enactment . In one sense, a man who owned a shop might bo said to keep it, though he might never have been within n hundred miles of it, but his Honor thought that it was clear that the words were not used in that souse in the section in question. This and other considerations disposed of the plaintiff’s claim for in respect of the Newtown shojj. as to which there was possibly inbl-enf(Sttur for the contention that it was Itapfc. at. an open shop for dispensing prescriptions. The board could not. under any circumstances, properly register the plaintiff. It was inconceivable that- thV board could, after such an iutimatioip of opinion from this Court, reverse its" former decision. There was ample authority for the.proposition that the Court would , not grant a mandamus when thore could be no result tc- tho proceeding ordered. There must, therefore, he judgment for

the defendant society. As, however, the board had blundered in its proceeding upon the plaintiff’s application, and had thereby in a sense provoker] the action, there would be no costs.