A HARD REGULATION.

Globe, Volume XXIII, Issue 2149, 14 January 1881, Page 3

A HARD REGULATION.

The Dunedin Corporation have a very queer and harsh system of collecting gas-supply arrears. If a person leaves his premises without paying his gas bill, the next occupant gets no gas till he pays his predecessor's arrears. This plan was adopted (says the " Daily Times") in order to cause landlords to watch that their outgoing tenants settled their gas soores ere they left; but how harshly the plan operates was exemplified by some cases which were referred to at the Council meeting yesterday. One gas defaulter had vacatod a shop in Princess street, which thereafter remained unoccupied for ten months ; then it was pulled down ; new premises were built; a new tradesman opened a business, but to his utter astonishment had to pay £5 of a twelve-months-old gas bill before the Corporation would grant him a supply. This, it will be allowed, was highly ridiculous. Another instance showed that a defaulter removed to new premises, with this result :_ In his new place of business he got the gas without a murmur, whilst the unfortunate individual who took his former tenement had to pay up his predecessor's gas bill ere he could light his shop. These examples served to convinco the Council of the rottenness of the system, and the gas committee are to consider and report as to the best method to be pursued in future.