AID TO MOTORISTS

Evening Post, Volume CX, Issue 138, 9 December 1930, Page 11

AID TO MOTORISTS

FEEE LEGAL DEFENCE

AUTOMOBILE CLUB'S MOVE

While making it quite plain that it had no desire to encourage or countenance offences against the bylaws or the motor regulations, the executive of the Wellington Automobile Club last ovening decided to investigate the possibility of providing free legal defence for its members in cases brought in the Magistrate's Court. The hope was expressed that it would be possible to put the scheme into operation early nest year. lii submitting the proposal to tho meeting, the chairman (Mr. E. A. Batt) said that such a scheme would be a great help to motorists, who at tho present timo were almost entirely at the mercy of traffic inspectors and the police. By that he meant that in cases in which the defendant was unable to submit corroborative evidence to counteract the evidence of the traffic inspector or the police officer the decision almost invariably went against him. The majority of motorists were very often unable to spare the time to attend Court personally, and consequently they allowed prosecutions to go by default, and were often fined much more heavily than they would have been if they had appeared. Mr. Batt thought the club should give members some protoction. As time went on traffic inspectors found it was comparatively easy to secure convictions, and that tended to increase the number of prosecutions. If the club assisted members there would, he felt, be a big increase in membership. He thought that the club should decline to handle cases in which drunkenness was alleged, as it was undesirable that the impression should get abroad that the club was countenancing that sort of thing. However, that was a very debateable point, and could be left over for subsequent decision. Mr. Batt said he wanted to make it quite plain that in suggesting free defence he was not actuated by any desire to encourage motorists to defy the law. The club had always stood for a strict observance of the law. Mr. A. J. Toogood said he was in agreement with Mr. Batt in regard to the provision of free legal defence, but he thought it would be a mistake to lay it down definitely that the club would not defend cases in which drunkenness was alleged. That should be left to the solicitor to decide. There might be a case in which a man had had one drink and had become involved in an accident. If the police alleged drunkenness such a man should be defended. Mr. Batt said that one drink might affect the driving of some men, whereas other men might not be affected by half a dozen drinks. It was a difficult question. "I don't want the impression to get abroad that this club will defend drunkenness," said Mr. Batt. "That is the point. We have to be very careful of public opinion." The meeting approved of the chairman's suggestion, and referred the question to a committee to draft a report for submission to a later meeting. .