DRIVING STOCK AT NIGHT

Evening Post, Volume CVII, Issue 14, 17 January 1924, Page 8

DRIVING STOCK AT NIGHT

CONVICTIONS AT UPPER HUTT.

It is perhaps not generally. known that it is an offence against the 'Stock Act for drovers to drive stock at night. The prohibited hours are, during the summer months of the year, ' between 8 in the evening and 4: in the morning, •and during- the winter months, between 6 in the evening ana,6 in the morning. If drivers desire to use these hours they must obtain a permit from either a postmaster, a constable, or a Justice of the Peace or'an''officer-, of'the Stock" Department. ../rhe reason for the-prohibi-tion is the ease with which drovers may, either aceidently or ' deliberately, pick up stray' stock on the road or from adjoining paddocks. . ■

At the Upper Hutt Court yesterday, before Mr. C. R. Orr-Walker S/M ' Cecil B. M'Lean, W. G. Page, and F. j. Roberts^ were each .charged with two breaches of'tlie "Act; "and were each'cbn-' victed and fined £5 and 7s-costsven one charge, the other charge being in each case withdrawn. ■-, -''■■" ..... y ..\

Mr. T. C. Webb, who appeared for the Department,,said,that the men prosecuted bore excellent: characters-., and there was:"no /suggestion'^ : .that 'the-: law had been broken for any wrong purpose. Drovers found the night hours a convenient .time for driving stock, owing to the absence of traffic, but! because"*certain things had happened— not in connection with these men—the 'Department had decided to strictly enforce the Act, and after giving due warning these men had been prosecuted as an example to others.