APPEAL LOST

Evening Post, Volume CXVIII, Issue 89, 12 October 1934, Page 10

APPEAL LOST

MEMBERSHIP OF UNION

APPLICANT'S CHARACTER

No justification has been found by the Court of 'Appeal for disturbing the finding of Mr. Justice Eeed that Edwin Charles Batt could not compel tho Napier Waterside Workers' Union to admit him. as a member. The Court of Appeal, in its reserved decision today, held that Batt had not proved himself .to be a person holding the qualifications for membership laid down by; a rule of the union.

The rule in question provided, inter aiia, that the applicant- for membership must, in the opinion of the union executive, be of good character and sober habits. The appeal turned on the question of whether there was evidence upon which the union could hon* estly find that Batt was not of good character and sober habits. The five Judges who heard the appeal have held that there was sufficient material to justify such a decision, and they have agreed that the appeal should be dismissed. The Chief Justice (Sir Michael Myers), in his judgment, said that Mr. Justice Eeed had held that the appellant could not be regarded as a person of good character and sober habits. "There was undoubtedly evidence to justify that finding," the Chief Justice continued. "Indeed the appellant's own admissions were in themselves probably sufficient. That being so, the appellant has not proved himself to be a person holding the qualifications for membership laid down by the rule, and, however much I sympathise with him on the ground that relatively ho may be almost snow-white as compared with some few of the existing members of the union, I feel, bound to hold that his case fails fundamentally." On the Bench with the Chief Justice at the hearing of the appeal were Mr. Justice Herdinan, Mr. Justice Blair, Mr. Justice Kennedy, and Mr. Justice

Fair. Mr. J. Mason, of Napier, appeared for the appellant, and Mr. P. J. O'Began, Wellington, for the union.