THE TAUMARUNUI SEAT

New Zealand Times, Volume XL, Issue 9044, 15 May 1915, Page 6

THE TAUMARUNUI SEAT

By the decision in the Taumarunui case the Election Court has" adopted what it considered the simplest road to finality. There were, the court declares in its judgment, raised numerous and difficult questions', on which it need not express an opinion because it had decided on the basis of the candidate’s electoral qualification, and for the same reason the court declined to order a scrutiny. With the latter we agree because under the circumstances a scrutiny would have been a waste of time. But the course adopted with regard to the numerous and difficult questions is a source of legitimate regret, because by that course the opportunity ol settling the difficulties of these numer-, ous questions was. lost. Now, wo takc it that an election court is set up not merely to decide the question of the validity or otherwise of an election, but also to decide what moot points, „i) any, there may be in the genesis of the question of validity, in this" case we regret therefore that the value of the verdict is so much less than the country had the right to expect from the court As to the question of residence, it as well, perhaps, for Mr Jennings that thcourt has decided that, according to the provisions of the Act, Mi - Jennings resided “not in Taumarunui, hut in New' Plymouth.” Because if Mr Jennings wishes to qualify for another contest all he has to do is to register in New Plymouth, where, if ho has resided at all—and the court says he has—he has resided more than three months previous to any application he may make for registration. It is unfortunate that the Act does not contain a definition ol residence, because there are many people who reside in one district and work in another, or in several others. We do not question the court’s decision in the case, which is practically that Mr Jennings had no place of abode in the legal sense in the district of Taumarunui. But as misunderstandings on the point may easily arise in the future, we . think it would he well for ■ the Legislature to endeavour to do something by way of definition, based on the present judgment, to settle the point beyond doubt.