CERTIFICATE BY DOCTOR

Taranaki Daily News, 19 July 1932, Page 7

CERTIFICATE BY DOCTOR

ALLEGATION IN COURT.

MAGISTRATE’S COMMENT.

“I am absolutely astonished that any medical practitioner should certify that a man was not fit for any occupation when he had not seen him for twelve months,” said Air. R. T. Bailey, officer-in charge of the Labour Department, at Christchurch, during the hearing of a case in the Magistrate’s Court on Wednesday, in which a man was charged with making a false declaration under the Unemployment Act. “The department is coining to place so little reliance upon the medical certificates of some doctors,” continued Mr. Bailey, “that we are now submitting our cases to the Hospital Board for authentic certificates.”

The defendant stated in evidence that he had taken blank exemption forms to a doctor who had operated on him some 12 months previously, and the latter had filled them in while defendant’s own sections of the forms were blank.

The magistrate: The serious part of it, if true, is that the doctor filled in. tho forms in blank. Tho defendant could have given them to anyone. A medical practitioner who would do such a thing would be risking his professional reputation.

Under cross-examination defendant eaid that he “might have filled in the forms previously at the post office, but he thought that they were blank when the doctor had signed them.” He admitted having done a certain amount of taxi-driving in the last 12 months.