CENSURE MOTION UPON GOVERNMENT TO BE MOVED.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 18419, 22 March 1928, Page 10

CENSURE MOTION UPON GOVERNMENT TO BE MOVED.

LABOUR TO HIT FEDERAL AUTHORITIES. By Telegraph.—Press Assn.—Copyright. CANBERRA, March 21. In the House of Representatives Mr Brennan, on behalf of the Labour Party, gave notice of motion of censure on the Government in connection with the Abrahams income tax case. The motion reads: “That the action of the Government in participating in improper and unprincipled bargaining with self-confessed malefactors is repugnant to right practice and not in harmony with the correct and settled practice of governments in the administration of criminal law T .”—Aust. and N.Z. Press Assn. As a sequel to the taxation raid in August, an action was commenced in the High Court at Melbourne recently in respect to shortage of income tax paid by three brothers named Abraham. The Taxation Commissioner claimed very large sums from defendants. The defendants admitted the truth of the Commissioner’s case, and said that they had paid the sum of £500,000 in satisfaction. Mr Justice Starke expressed surprise that the Crown had compromised with the tax payers. He considered that the pleadings and the defence alike disclosed a conspiracy, and that there should have been a prosecution under the Crimes Act. He refused to make an order, and in his judgment said that the avowed purpose of the proceedings was to use the judgment of the Court for the purpose of executing and enforcing an arrangement with defendants, and so long as that arrangement and purpose subsisted he w r as not prepared to give any judgment lending the aid of the Court to any such purpose.