ACT FAILS TO CREATE AN OFFENCE

Chronicle (Levin), 14 August 1946, Page 4

ACT FAILS TO CREATE AN OFFENCE

— OBTAINING OF TWO DRIVER'S LICENSES Reserved judgment has now been delivered by Mr. A. M. Goulding, S.M., in a case heard recently in une Levin Magistrate's Court, in which the Transport Department charged B. J. Trout, of Levin, with obtaming a driver's license from che Wellington C.ity Council while ne was stili the holder of a driver's license issued by the Levin Borough Council. The prosecution was made under section 21 of the Motor Vehicles Act, 1924. "It appears that the defendant was in fact the holder of a car driver's license which ne obtained from the Levin Borough Council on September 6, 1945," said Mr. Goulding, in the course of his judgment. "He was anxious to obtain a truck driver's license, but the traffic officers in the Levin district required him to go through a test before they would issue him with one. The defendant apparently felt tnat this was unreasonable, he being an experienced army driver. He then approached the Wellington City Council and was issued with both a car driver's license and. a heavy vehicle license." After quoting the section under which, the information was laid Mr. Goulding- said it did not declare that it was' an offence to obtain a motor driver's license while holding another motor driver's license. He held that the section relied upon by the inspector in support of his contentions that an offence had been committed had no bearing on the question. He agreed with counsel for the defendant that since the legislation had faiied to create an offence under the section, the prosecution could not succeed. . "I have no doubt that it was intended to create an offence," Mr. Goulding added, "but the section has not done so." The section aimed at preventing the issue of licenses by different local authorities when a motorist was already in possession of a license, Mr. Goulding concluded, but it did not declare that obtaining such. a .license was an offence, nor- did it. preseribe any penalty. Moreover, he could not find in the Act amy;.-see.tipn such ?as was commonlyV- \ If oufi'd, ? $ %hich declared that the breach of any provision of the Act constituted an offence. Mr. Goulding therefore dismissed the information against Trout. At the hearing of the case Inspector Peters prosecuted and Mr. N. M. Thomson appeared for the defendant.