LAW-COURT DETAILS

Sun (Auckland), Volume 1, Issue 85, 1 July 1927, Page 16

LAW-COURT DETAILS

CONTROL OF REPORTS MR. FRASER’S BILL (TIIE SUN'S Parliamentary Reporter .) WELLINGTON, Thursday. Press reports of court proceedings would be subject to control if Mr. P. Fraser’s Judicial Proceedings (Regulation of Reports) Bill were to become law. Mr. Fraser has given notice in the House to introduce the Bill. The Bill proposes it shall be unlawful to print or publish any indecent matter or indecent medical, surgical or physiological details the publication of which would be calculated to injure public morals. It also proposes that in connection with divorce or separation proceedings or action for restitution of conjugal rights it shall only be lawful to publish (a) the names, addresses .and occupations of the parlies and witnesses; (b) a concise statement of the charges, defences and counter-charges in support of which evidence has been given: (c) the submission on any point of law arising in ... course of the proceedings and the court’s decision thereon: (d) the summing-up of the judge and the jury’s finding (if any), and the judgment of the court and observations made by the judge in giving judgment. The penalty for infringement is suggested as not more than four months’ imprisonment or a fine not exceeding £SOO. No person other than a proprietor. editor, master printer, or publisher shall be liable to conviction. Bona-fide publications of a technical character, intended for circulation among members of the legal or medical professions, and official law reports are exempt from the provisions of the Bill.