The Bay of Plenty Beacon Published Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays. FRIDAY, APRIL 5, 1946 COURT PENALTIES

Bay of Plenty Beacon, Volume 9, Issue 59, 5 April 1946, Page 4

The Bay of Plenty Beacon Published Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays. FRIDAY, APRIL 5, 1946 COURT PENALTIES

READERS who from time to time compare the sentences passed upon court delinquents must surely have been puzzled as to the wide variance m values between the fines m flicted and the alternative term of imprisonment which can be served An instance of this nature makes yesterdays charge of theft, a case in point. The bench with even gravity pointed out that the maximum fine was £2O and the alteinative term of imprisonment—six months. The disparagement is apparent and cries out for an adjustment more m keeping with the basic wage now payable to all adult wageearners by legislation. The minimum wage receivable by a manual worker today is £5 weekly, which spread over a term of six months would be at least £l2O. If m the courts wisdom the prisoner who was fined half the monetary penalty yesterday had been sentenced to half the term laid down by the code of imprisonments he would have lost approximately £6O in relative wages. This makes it obvious that the existing penalty list is outdated like many other things written into our legislation, and is badly m need ox overhaul. Forty years ago when £2 and £3 weekly was considered a good working-man’s wage the penalty by fine and the alternative imprisonment term were in reasonable agreement, but the interpretation of it today means that the man who is punished by monetary fine suffers a penalty four or five times lighter than the unfortunate who is marched off to gaol without option.