STRICT READING OF BY-LAWS

Southland Times, Issue 24210, 21 August 1940, Page 6

STRICT READING OF BY-LAWS

COUNCILLOR SEEKS ELASTICITY PAINTING OF SIGN IN DEE STREET A complaint that the council and its officers were reading the by-laws too strictly' was made by Cr A. W. Jones at the meeting of the Invercargill City Council last night. The remarks were made during a discussion on a recommendation by the Works Committee that a sign writer be given 14 days in which to remove certain words from a sign above a veranda in Dee street, failing which he be prosecuted. “The by-laws are not the laws of the Medes and the Persians,” he said. “We want some elasticity in the administration of the by-laws.” The Deputy-Mayor (Mr J. R. Martin) said that if the clause was rejected two other firms which had complied with the by-laws had been penalized. Cr Jones: We want no Hitler or Mussolini in our department: We should make it clear that we are not going to have it.

Cr A. Wachner said the city engineer sent out many notices threatening to prosecute residents. “I believe that if he had his way he would prosecute 95 per cent, of the people of Invercargill,” he said. “I consider that these letters should go before the council before they are sent.” Cr R. T. Parsons: As I see it this council has another eight months to go before an election. When it comes I hope the people will elect councillors with common sense.

The Deputy-Mayor: That remark is most insulting and quite uncalled for. Cr G. C. Broughton said the sign writer had been given a permit to paint a certain sign and had included words not approved in the permit. The committee’s recommendation was adopted on the vote of the DeputyMayor.