MOTOR REGULATIONS

Timaru Herald, Volume CXXXVIII, Issue 19861, 26 July 1934, Page 11

MOTOR REGULATIONS

INTERESTING POINT RAISED. By Telegraph —Press Association _ ' AUCKLAND, July 25. The question whether the police have power to charge a person with not paying the full amount of the third party risk in pursuance of the premium, in addition to charging the same person with using a motor vehicle without renewing the licence by the end of May, was raised by Mr S. R Mason in the Magistrate’s Court The type of prosecution in which MiMason s client was concerned was one of many in which convictions have been entered recently in connection with alleged breaches of the motor regulations.

Mr Mason said it was set out in sec- ' '_? n s of the Motor Vehicles Insurance (third party risks) Act, 1928, that on making application for the issue of a license, the owner shall pay the prescribed insurance premium, and it was also provided that no licence shall be issued until the premium is paid. Mr Mason submitted that under section 17 of the Act it was an offence to use a t£ el ? iC J e f ° r a P ur P°se different * or , whlch an insurance premium had been taken out. Inspector Edwards, who conducted the prosecution, claimed that by the Act it was intended to make it an offence not to insure at all. He contended that the section under which the prosecution was made applied to all vehicles that had not been re licensed and, therefore insured under the third party risk. According to his interpretation of the Act the inspector said, the two charges were justified. Mr Mason, who contended that the charge of not insuring a vehicle should be withdrawn, said the words of section 17 “but failure by an otvner to comply with the requirements of this sub-section shall not affect the contract of insurance” presupposed an existing contract, which was inconsistent with his client's case, where there was no licence at all. Mr Wyvern Wilson S.M., said the question was a very interesting one to which he would give consideration.