RATIONING OFFENCES

Otago Daily Times, Issue 25239, 31 May 1943, Page 3

RATIONING OFFENCES

CASES IN ENGLAND FINES AND IMPRISONMENT LONDON, May 28. Grosvenor House, Park Lane, a luxury hotel, was fined £SOO and 50 guineas costs for obtaining between February 7 and June 6,72061 b of fish; it was entitled only to 13221 b under the Catering Establishments Order. Maurice Smith, the hotel’s buyer, was sentenced to six week’s imprisonment; Cecil Abbott, assistant catering manager, to a month’s imprisonment. The magistrate said: “This is a scandalous case. If I could send a company to prison I would send Grosvenor House. The ordinary citizen is lucky if he gets any fish, and what he gets is usually what before the war would not have been considered fit for human consumption.” Mrs Rachel Levy, a confectioner, was fined £SOO, with costs not exceeding £l2O, after pleading guilty to various charges of using and disposing of sweet coupons and. receiving stolen ration documents. Six men were sentenced to terms of imprisonment ranging from nine to 21 months on similar charges. The latest figures of food prosecutions issued revealed that there were 2990 in Britain last January, 2847 of which were Successful.