A BALCONY CASE.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 10198, 6 July 1911, Page 3

A BALCONY CASE.

A ca«e involving the rights of tho Christchurch City Council to claim license fees for balconies or porticoes erected in front of buildings in the citywas heard before Mr H. VI. Bishop, S.M., at the Magistrate's Court this morning; when the Christchurch City Council claimed f I*olll Milner * 1 ru i Thomson, Limited, the sum of £4 17s bd. license fee owing 111 respect of a. certain balcony 111 front of tho firm s premises in Manchester Street, and pavable on January 1, 1910, under Section 24 of Christchurch City By-law No. 4, 1908. Mr Loughnan appeared for the Council and Mr Harper for the defendants. Mr Loughnan briefly outlined the facts of the case. lu 1009 the defendants had applied for leave to build a balcony outside their premises in Manchester Street.. The letter had been considered by the By-laws Committee ot the Council, and permission had been granted on certain conditions. One of the conditions had been that- they should take out a license under the bylaw. They had done so, and had paid the license fee for the iirsL year, but had failed to pay the fee for the second vear. He contended that the case was in 110 sense a hy-law one, but was a case arising from the breach of a special contract.

Mr Harper said that he considered that the Court was not competent to deal with the, ease, as it should hav\s been dealt with summarily as a breach of the by-law. Benjamin Throp. City Inspector, called 'by Mr Loughm>n, said that when the balcony in question had becu com- 1 nleted the license ice required by tho Council, £'l l"s 6d. had been paid.' That was on November 6, 1!J0 C J. Replying to Mr Harper, ho said that he had inspected the balcony in question. Anyone could step out of the. windows of tho premises on to it. The proprietors of other buildings in Christohurch with balconies in front <rf them had to pay license fees at tho same rate. Mr Harper, in outlining tho case for the defence, said that the Council had all its power from the Municipal Corporations Act,, and he quoted Section 315 to show that no power was given to the Council to license, or to charge a license fee, for the erection of any balcony or portico, though it might grant permission for the erection of such. He could find no trace in the New Zealand law reports of a civil action having been brought before the Court for the breach of a by-law instead of the Council concerned first having (Sought a penalty summarily for the breach, and he quoted numerous eases heard in the English law Courts to show that the present proceedings were irregular. Mr Loughnan said that the Council was not suing under tho by-law, but was suing for breach of a contract. a.nd he quoted numerous eases to show that the case was in order. 1110 Magistrate stated that he would not call on Mr Harper to bring evidence in defence of the case. No contract had been proved to his satisfaction, and tho plaintiff would therefore ho nonsuited. No order was in ado us + 0 COS.*