CHARGE DENIED

Te Awamutu Courier, Volume 77, Issue 6975, 8 October 1948, Page 5

CHARGE DENIED

ALLEGED STALE MILK DAIRY COMPANY PROSECUTED Decision was reserved by Mr S L. Paterson, S.M., in the Magistrate’s Court, Hamilton yesterday when the New Zealand Co-operative Dairy Co., Ltd. (Mr W. J. King defended a prosecution by the Health Department (Mr K. L. Sandford) alleging that on June 23, 1948, at Hamilton East, the company sold milk which did not comply with the standards prescribed by the Food and Drugs Regulations, 1946, iq that when subjected to the reductase test it completely discolourised methylene blue in less than four hours. Mr Sandford called James W. Parker, an inspector of the Health Department, who said that early in the morning of June 23 he stopped a milkman named Lithgow in a zone allotted to the dairy company, who employed Lithgow as delivery man. He bought a pint of milk, and told Lithgow it was for analysis. The milk was divided into three portions as required by the regulations. The analyst’s report was relied on by the prosecution.

That morning, said witness, several dozen samples were taken in Hamilton from various vendors. He understood the milk came from the company’s factory at Newstead. June 23 was in a period when there was extreme scarcity of milk, and emergency supplies of milk, he was informed, were obtained from Matangi and other factories to maintain regular supplies to the public.

To the Court, witness said the reductase test was one of staleness, while the resazurin test was one for both staleness and cleanliness.

Mr King said that in the emergency it was necessary for the factory manager to make a quick decision and he decided, rather than to have no milk at all for the consumers, to pasteurise the milk on hand and deliver it. There had been no complaints from the consumers, although it was known that a section of the public had expressed strong opposition to pasteurised milk. He asked for the dismissal of the information, but Mr Paterson decided to hear the evidence.

Continuing, counsel told of the extreme difficulty in maintaining supply, and how the emergency was met by obtaining fresh milk from Matangi and Waitoa factories.

Evidence for the defence was given by Joseph Ray, assistant to the factory superintendent; Daniel J. Moran, manager of the Newstead factory; and Ward H. Udy chief chemist for the company. At one stage the magistrate commented that no milk in the Dominion would comply with the standards set down by the Health Department, which was trying to operate an impossible regulation. In Moran’s evidence he said that pasteurisation did not effect the quality of milk, nor did it make stale milk good, but it kept good milk good. He added that he believed that the trouble would have been avoided or overcome if milk had been pasteurised, as that would prevent substandard milk.

The reductase test was a good one for sorting out milk quality, said the witness Udy. It did not say that milk was safe, but it showed any staleness.