BIG FIRMS IN COURT

Sun (Auckland), Volume III, Issue 776, 24 September 1929, Page 10

BIG FIRMS IN COURT

CLAIM FOR £5,470 ON WHEAT DEAL BRANDING OF SACKS (From Our Resident Reporter) WELLINGTON, Today. Claiming £5,470, plus interest at S per cent., and storage charges, for 5,649 sacks of oats, the New Zealand Loan and Mercantile Agency Co., Ltd., alleging breach of contract, sued Wright, Stephenson, and Co.. Lid., and continuation of the action was heard in the Supreme Court yesterday before the Chief Justice, the lion. M. Myers. Air. F. H. O’Leary, in opening the case for the defence, said he intended to call evidence to show that the procedure of branding sacks observed in different districts in the South Island was not haphazard or wrong, as might have been gathered from the evidence for the plaintiff company.

“What I thought was this,” said his Honour. “First of all, irrespective of the merits of the case, a grader should show .that the sacks he grades are branded in accordance with the certificate, otherwise his certificate is untrue, and should not. be taken. Secondly, in the interests of the warehousemen, it is in the highest degree important that that should be done, because frequently oats are sold on the warrants and in accordance with the description in the stock warrant, and if that is done and the precise sacks branded as described cannot be delivered, the purchaser has the right to object, and you will have all sorts of trouble. Not only that, but the business of branding obviously leads to the possibility of fraud.”

Mr. O'Leary suggested that his Honour should address the witness on the subject.

His Honour said he did not wish to deliver a homily, but with regard to the practice of branding sacks only after the issue of the warrant, when such a question arose he thought it advisable to point out to the trade generally the dangers of the practice. The hearing was adjourned.