HON. DR MCNAB SUED.

Manawatu Herald, Volume XXXVIII, Issue 1515, 26 February 1916, Page 3

HON. DR MCNAB SUED.

ALLEGATION OF SLANDER

Hon. Dr. McNab, Minister for Justice is being sued for slander by Mr Frederick William Schramm, registrar of electors at Te Kuiti.

The plaintiff In the action claims to recover from Dr. McNab damages for alleged slander. He alleges that prior to the election the defendant addressed a meeting of electors at Hangatiki, and that on that occasion' he said; “Mr Jennings will be returned on Tuesday, unless it is otherwise arranged in the office of the returning officer at Te Kuiti.” Plaintiff claims that this language imputed that he was capable of committing a very grave breach of his duty.

Defendant, in his filed statement of defence, denies that he used the words attrib : i 'o him. He says that the woiuo ue actually used were: —‘‘If we lose, we have lost in the registrar’s office,” and the context in which he used them was as follows :—He was pointing out to the electors that, with\one exception, there had never been a case in which an election had been upset when the unseated man bad not been re-elected ; that since the general election there had been considerable activity in the registrar’s office in the way of receiving new applications for enrolment ; and, in using the words, he was referring to this activity, and not designing to impute impropriety to anyone,