DAIRY INDUSTRY

Southland Times, Issue 22499, 8 December 1934, Page 8

DAIRY INDUSTRY

FACTORY MANAGERS DEGREE OF COMPETENCY REGULATIONS ASSAILED (Per United Press Association.) Palmerston North, Dec. 7. The opinion that the regulations made by an Order in Council on February 12, 1934, under the Dairy Industry Amendment Act 1933, Section 2, were defective in that they did not state, as required by Sub-Section (a), that the section prescribes the qualifications of persons competent to be employed as managers of dairy factories of any specified class or classes, was expressed in a judgment delivered by Mr J. L. Stout, S.M., who heard the appeal of David Andrew Fitzgerald, of Shannon, against the decision of the Dairy Factory Managers’ Registration Board, not to admit him. The result, said the Magistrate, is that neither the Registration Board set up under the regulations, nor appellate tribunal, is in a position to form an opinion as to the right of applicant to be registered under the Act. I therefore send the application back to the board for reconsideration. I think it necessary also, from what has been disclosed at this hearing, to state that in my opinion, applicant’s case has not been properly dealt with by the board. If the board is doubtful on a written application and testimonials submitted to it, they should, before refusing registration, give applicant an opportunity of being heard, and should not act merely upon hearsay evidence collected by themselves without giving applicant any reason for refusal to register or the opportunity of answering their objections. “There is one further matter to which I think I should refer. Under Regulation 16 (B) the board is to form an opinion as to the competency of applicant. If the regulation purports to leave the board the fixing of the standard of competency required before a person is entitled to be registered, then I consider the regulation ultra vires. If it means only that the board should form an opinion whether applicant reaches the prescribed standard, then the regulation is good, but as I have already stated, the regulations are defective in not prescribing such standard.”