LOCAL BODY RATING

Sun (Auckland), Volume IV, Issue 1053, 18 August 1930, Page 10

LOCAL BODY RATING

RECENT NORTHCOTE TEST CASE JUDGMENT

ACTION TO BE TAKEN Press Association WELLINGTON, Today. The ruling of the Full Court in regard to the, action instituted by the Northcot© Borough Council for testing section 69 of the Rating Act, 1925, has an application far wider than Xorthcote, for every local body which levies rates upon the basis of unimproved values —and the Wellington City Council is one—is concerned. «o far no official steps have been taken in Wellington, but the Mayor, Mr. G. A. Troup, stated on Saturday that action would certainly be taken, not only by the City Council and other bodies concerned, but through the Municipal Association. Unfortunately the association held its quarterly meeting only a few days before the announcement by the court of its decision, but the question is so important that it can hardly be allowed to wait until the regular date of the next quarterly meeting. The Court of Appeal recently gave judgment for defendant in the case of the Borough of Nurthcote versus Arthur George Buchanan. The case was brought by the Mayor, councillors and burgesses o', the Borough of Xorthcote against the defendant Buchanan, commission agent. Section 69 of the Rating Act, 1925, provides that where a dwelling-house or other building remains vacant for a period of not less than six months, whether continuously or not, and the person rated gives the local authority, within 14 days after the expiration of the said period, a notice in writing of the dates on which the house became vacant, such person shall be liable to pay only half the rates otherwise payable. RATING IN FORCE * The question raised by the summons concerned the effect of that section where the system of rating on the unimproved value is in force. Defendant was the owner of property with a dwelling-house erected thereon, in Queen Street, Xorthcote, where rating on the unimproved value was in force. His property was vacant for six months during the rating year ended March, 1929, and, having given the notice required by section G 9, he applied for the remission of half the rates levied. The question of his liability was determined by the court as follows: “We can see no reason whatever for limiting the construction of section 69 of the Rating Act in the manner contended for by the plaintiffs. Reading the words ‘such dwelling-house or other building’ as Ave think they must be read, as meaning land and dwell-ing-houses, or. Avhat is the same thing. dAvelling-house or building and land within its curtailage, the basis or system upon which the property is rated seems to us to be quite immaterial. “Where a person oAvns land upon which a dAA'elling-house is erected his rates are still payable, whatever the basis or system may be upon which the rates are made or leA’ied. The point is, AA'e think, that the words ‘in respect of such dwelling-house or other building,’ whatever they may mean (and we have indicated what Ave think they mean), apply to the same subject matter. whateA'er the basis or system or rating may be.

“When once this point is appreciated the supposed difficulty ceases, and it follows that section 69 does not apply to a district where the system of rating is on the unimproved A*alue, as Avell as to the district Avhere the system in force is that of rating on either annual value or capital v-alue.”