MOTOR CARS AND INNOCENCE

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LII, Issue 109, 7 June 1909, Page 4

MOTOR CARS AND INNOCENCE

A RECKLESS CHAUFFEUR. ''Hope some .mention will be made at the meeting for the protection of the innocent.—Bleakley." This was a bit of a conundrum which presented itself to the Clifton county clerk before the commencement of the Council meeting. He immediately placed the responsibility for the message upon the shoulders of Mr. E. (i. Bleakley, contractor, of Uremii, mid then dovetailed it hi to n reported accident to one of .Mr. Weakley's teams as the result of indiscreet driving by a motorist. When the telegram va s read at the meeting the councillors were at a loss to understand it, but the chairman said that doubtless it referred to an incident of last Monday week, when Mr. Bleakley had an accident. He had drawn his team in hard against a 'bank to allow a motor-car to pass. Just as the car was within a few yards of him the driver shifted his direction so as to bring the car dangerously and unneceisarily close to the horses, which, although used to cars and generally quite indifferent to them, 'were not quite prepared for this sort of thing, and straightway clambered up the bank and capsized the waggon and its contents. Mr. Foreman said he himself came along just afterwards, and he could bear testimony to the fact that the motorist left very little room. He had gone into the matter of motor trallic since Ids previous remarks to the Council on the question, and had found that the law which, gave local ibodies power to deal with the speed of cars was so hampered with conditions as' to be a fraud and a delusion.

Cr. Sullivan said that there were s outc motorists who used couinum-sense when driving on steep or winding roads; the others didn't.

In answer to a question as to the amount of damage dont in Mr. Bleakley's case, the'chairman said that ho had "lost a lot of steam.'' and for s'oaie minutes after the accident the air in Hie vicinity was surcharged with sulphur. Concluding, he said that the motor trallic and native rating laws were such that he wondered how 130 allegedly brainy men could have put them on the statute-book.