LICENSING PALI.

Hokitika Guardian, 28 December 1918, Page 4

LICENSING PALI.

THE SOLDIERS’ VOTES. PROVISION MADE BY \ ; REGULATIONS,;-:; ; y.. ' The details!of the procedure for re- ' cording the soldiers’ votes at- the ■pecial licensing poll in March or April next are laid down in regulations published in a “ Gazette Extraordinary,” issued, last week. Provision is made for the recording of votes'in Great Britain and in Western or Central Europe, Egypt, Southern Europe,-arid Asia, Samoa, on transports, and in New Zealand. The regulations provide that every .person making application for a voting-paper under these, regulations shall be required to produce his military. pay-book to the electoral officer or cleric, as evidence of the fact that he is entitled to vote, aud the electoral officer or clerk, on giving to the voter a voting-paper, shall enter in the paybook' a statement of that fact and of the polliug-place at which the vote is recorded,'and shall initial the entry. The following sections apply to members of the New Zealand Expeditionary Force who are in New Zealand at the time that the poll is taken : 1. For the purpose of taking the votes of the members of any Expeditionary Force in New Zealand to whom section of the said Act applies, the,Chief ..Electoral Officer shall appoint such polling-place as lie thinks fit, 2, (1) Every member of ail Expeditionary Force to whom section 12 applies, and who is in New Zealand on the day fixed for the taking of the special licensing poll, shall be entitled to vote on producing to the Electoral Officer his military pay-book, together with a certificate signed by a military officer or other competent authority that he is a member of an Expeditionary Force under the Act, and that he is for the time being stationed in a camp .of” mi'itary training, or in a hospital, sanatorium, or other public institution ; provided that the Electoral Officer, if he is satisfied that any person making application for a voting-paper is entitled to vote under these regulations, may issue to him a voting-paper and accept the vote notwithstanding that the applicant has not produced a certificate as required by this clause. 2. For the purposes of these regulations every member of the New Zealand Expeditionary Forces who returns to New Zealand at any time after the Ist, day of February, 191!.), aqd before the date of the taking of the special licensing poll, and who is foi/any reason unable to vote as an elector of any electoral district, shall be.;entitled to vote under this clause as if he were a member of an Expeditionary Force for the time being (stationed iu a camp of military, training. : 7 ,3. Any person to whom the last preceding sub-clause relates may vote at any polling place in New Zealand on making, before a Returning Officer oi; Deputy Returning Officer, a declaration.that he is entitled to vote under these regulations. In any such case the Returning Officer or Deputy Returning Officer shall issue to the applicant a voting-paper, aud, after the voter has recorded his vote, shall,

in tho preseuce of the voter, enclose the voting-paper iu nil v envelope addressed- to the - Chief Electoral Officer nt Wellington, and shall forthwith forward the same by registered, letter to the; Chief Electoral .(pffiieyr. -