SUPPLYING LIQUOR TO NATIVES.

Manawatu Herald, Volume XXXIV, Issue 1073, 23 July 1912, Page 3

SUPPLYING LIQUOR TO NATIVES.

POLICE v. WHITE

LICENSEE CONVICTED

Mr A. D. Thomson, S.M., delivered judgment at Palmerston North yesterday, in the case in .which Wm. J. White, of Foxtou, was charged on two separate informations that he did, on the 27th and 29th of April, 1912, at Foxton, supply liquor to natives for consumption off the premises, contrary to section 43 of the Licensing Act, 1910. Both informations were by consent heard together. The defendant was on the date mentioned licensee 01 Whyte’s Hotel, Poxton, which is within the Kuruhaupo district, a district proclaimed under section 43 of the Licensing Act, ■ 1910. It was proved that on the date mentioned his barmaid, Myra Campbell, did sell liquor to natives for consumption oft the premises, and in completion ot the sale did deliver liquor to them. For her offences she had been convicted and fined. It was admitted the present defendant was absent on both occasions, and did not know of his barmaid’s acts. In his Worship’s opinion, the barmaid's acts were within the scope of her general employment, and the defendant was responsible for sales made by her. It was, however, argued that under the section under which the informations were laid, only one person could be convicted, and that one the person who actually delivered the liquor to the natives. In a decision on a similar section in the 1904 Act, his Honour, Mr Justice Cooper, held that the word “supply” was wide enough to include a delivery to a person who was not the purchaser, but his Worship did not understand the decision to mean that the word “supply” was limited to manual delivery. If so it would be easy for a licensee to escape liability by simply asking a stranger in a bar to hand the liquor to the purchaser. ft seemed to him impossible to say that a sale completed by delivery was not a “supplying.” If an order for liquor came to a licensee from a native by post, and the liquor was sent by post, that would surely be a “supplying,” and his Worship did not think it would be argued that in such a case the agent, that is, the post office official, would be the only person liable. In the present case of the liquor by the baimaiJ was simply the completion of the sale, and, in his Worship’s opinion, the licensee must accept responsibility for the whole transaction. It might be a hardship to some extent on him that his servants broke orders, but they were chosen by himself, were entirely under his control, and any profit trom the transaction went to him. His Worship pointed out that in the case, Btewart v. Cullen, it was laid down that a licensee only authorises lawful sales, and that any unauthorised sale was a sale without a license. The defendant was convicted on both informations, and fined on each ,£3 and cost 7s.