POLL DECLARED VOID

Taranaki Daily News, 16 August 1935, Page 7

POLL DECLARED VOID

IRREGULARITIES PROVED QUESTION OF NAME ON ROLL. PAYMENT OF RATES SUFFICIENT. RETURNING OFFICER AT FAULT. By Telegraph—Press Association. Dannevirke, Last Night. Arising from a by-election for the Norsewood riding of the Dannevirke County Council caused by the death of a member the magistrate, Mr. J. L. Stout, this aftenoon heard a petition signed by the defeated candidates and five ratepayers asking that the poll be declared void on the grounds of alleged irregularities. When the poll was provisionally declared there was a double dead-heat, a tie for first and second places. On the official recount the returning officer declared Mr. H. A. Olsen ejected by a majority of one vote. Mr. H. Frederickson, who figured in the tie for first, was one of the petitioners to have the poll declared void. Evidence was given by Mr. Albert O. A. Petersen, a Norsewood farmer, that he had received rate demands for 1934 and 1935 which he paid on December 3. When he made application to the deputyreturning officer on the day of the byelection he was told his name was not on the roll. He voted by declaration, his vote subsequently being disallowed. The demand for rates was in his name. The returning officer, Mrs. F. M. Baker, stated in evidence that she had disallowed Mr. Petersen’s declaration vote because she had no knowledge of his voting qualifications. Evidence was given by a former assistant in the county council office that she had been advised that Mr. Petersen had taken over a property. She altered the rate demand and posted it to Mr. Petermagistrate said that should have been sufficient notice that Mr. Petersen was the occupier of a property. Mr. Petersen when forwarding postal notes in payment of his rates emphasised in a covering note that these were his rates which he was paying, and that was sufficient knowledge to the local authority that he was entitled to vote. Mr. Petersen had not had an opportunity of ascertaining whether he was on the roll because the roll had not been deposited in the Norsewood riding. As there was only one vote between the parties this might have affected the election and the magistrate declared the election void, with costs totalling £4 16s 6d against the returning officer.