SOLDIERS' BUSINESSES

Waikato Times, Volume 89, Issue 13850, 30 August 1918, Page 6

SOLDIERS' BUSINESSES

PROTECTION AGAINST RIVALS. PROFIT-SHARING SCHEME. Cabinet has adopted regulations de. signed to remove some of the hardships due to unfit men profiting in business through rivals being called up for service. The Minister for Defence states that it is intended, where men in businesses or professions in any district are called up the soldiers' businesses will be protected businesses, while others of the same remaining will be classed as "restricted businesses or professions." "We intend," said Sir James Allen, "to make those remaining help the called-up man to maintain his business. The administrative author. ity will be the National Efficiency Board, acting with the Suidicrs' Property Boards of Trustees constituted under the Soldiers' Property Regulations of 1917. When the National Efficiency Board is satisfied that any person is carrying on, or is about to carry on, any busines which will compete with the protected business of a soldier, and which will be rendered more profitable by the destruction or diminution of that protected business through the absence of the soldier on military service, the Board may give notice that such business is not to be carried on except under license by the Board. Every business covered by such a notice is described as a ' restricted business.' Iho notice may apply to the whole of such business or to any part. Such a license may be granted on condition that the licensee shall enter into a deed of agreement with the board of trustees of a protected business, acting on behalf of a soldier, to make to that board, on behalf of the soldier, such payments as may be estimated by the National l'ffi. ciency Board to be equivalent to the additional profits t<j be derived by the restricted business from the cessation or diminution of the protected i>nsiness. The amount may be o«timuted either as fixed sums or as defined proportions of the profits of the restricted business, or in any other manner ss is just and practicable in the particular case.

"Provision is made for the protection of the businesses of soldiers in partnership or as shareholders of companies. In the case of a company it is stated that the business shall be deemed to be a separate business to the extent of the share of the soldier in the company, and may become a protected business ?c----cordingly. In such a case ihe liSFihess of the comapny, to the extent of the interests of the other shareholders, may liecome a restricted business under these regultaions. A similar provision applies to partnerships. "Without the permission of the National Efficiency Board it shall nut be lawful for any person to establish or carry on any new business as a retail shoDkeeper, merchant, importer, exporter, commission agent, indent agent, accountant, auditor, rr.edic.il praoti. tioner, or dentist," states the regulations. "Permission may lie granted by the Itoard, with such restrictions as to the locality or manner in which the business shall be carried on as the board thinks necessary in the public interest. Any extension or alteration of an old business, whether in respect of locality, scope or nature, shall l>e deemed to be the establishment or carrying on of a new business within the meaning of the regulation. The fact that a business has been established with the permission of the board under this regulation shall in no manner take away, or affect with respect to that business, the powers conferred on the board with respect to protected and restricted businesses.'"