FIRST MOTOR LAW

Poverty Bay Herald, Volume LXIII, Issue 19023, 25 May 1936, Page 14

FIRST MOTOR LAW

QUAINT N.Z. STATUTE M.P.'S DISCOVERY (Parliamentary Reporter.) WELLINGTON; this day. When preparing his comment on, the Motor Transport Amendment Bill, Mr. J. Robertson, member for Masterton, went in for some research, and as a result was able to tell the House of Representatives or a highly interesting discovery which he made in records nearly 40 years old. It was in 1898 that New Zealand's Parliament paid its first attention to the horseless carriage, passing a statute which, as Mr. Robertson remarked, seemed very quaint in its provisions, but they gave some idea of the tremendous development that lias taken place in transport since the advent of the internal combustion engine. Mr. Robertson proceeded to describe the terms of the McLean Motor Car Act, 1898, a private measure of which it was said in the title: "An Act to authorise William McLean to use motor cars, and to enable other persons to obtain permits and licenses for a like purpose, and also to authorise the storage of inflammable substances used in driving such motor cars." The reason for this legislative innovation, as explained in the preamble, was that Mr. McLean and others had lately arranged for the introduction of motor cars into the colony,: but that it was doubtful whether such cars could lawfully be used on public roads and streets, and it was expedient that such power should be given. The clauses of the Act safeguarded the public against the emission of "smoke or visible vapour therefrom except from some-temporary or accidental cause," and made sure that the pioneer car driver. should be provided with a bell or other-instrument capable of giving audible, warning to his approach. - WARDING SIGNALS However, warning signals were not to end with a bell or other instrument, for in addition to limiting the speed of the vehicle to 12 miles per hour, a special clause enforced the carrying of a lamp during hours of darkness, and, as the design of the innovating transport medium was a little uncertain to the framers of the Statute, they included the precaution, in a regulation, "That motor cars shall be capable of being guided by a person sitting thereon." Mr. Robertson commented that we had obviously travelled a long way since 1898 in the matter of road transport, and we had reached a position when the immense industry had to be subject to a larger and more effective measure of control than had recently been the case. Unrestricted competition ended' in monopoly, and the country was fast getting into a position where transport was becoming a private monopoly, for the previous Government had carried out a policy which aimed at killing, as far as possible, the publicly owned enterprises. ''"'',,'