QUARTERLY LICENSING MEETING.

Tuapeka Times, Volume VII, Issue 406, 7 November 1874, Page 2

QUARTERLY LICENSING MEETING.

The first quarterly meeting of the Licensing Court, under the 1873 Act, and 1874 Amendment Act, it will be observed, by advertisement will be held on Tuesday Ist December, at the courthouses o£ Lawrence and Waitahuna. The following information and opinions on certain points of iuterests in connection with licenses, we extract from the " Mt. Ida Chronicle " :—: — " This is the only Court at which applications for new licenses can be entertained until the first Tuesday in June next. Applications for publicans' general licenses,- general night licenses, and bottle licenses, must be put iv in duplicate at least twenty-one days before the sitting of the Court. The applications for publicans' licenses must be accompanied (if not renewals) by a certificate signed by ten householders. , The night licenses will be granted under the Provincial Ordinance, as the clause to grant such licenses does not in any way conflict with the new Act as amended. It "might be safer to put in the certificate j it would do no harm. Applicants for bottle licenses do not need, certificates. Applicants for direct renewals do not require — unless notified by the Clerk of the Court of any special objection to he raised against their application—to attend personally or by agent on the day o£ hearing. Whether applicants for permanent transfers require to lodge their applications twenty-one days beforehand is" not very clear to vs — probably the Court would rule that they had. It would, at any rate be a debateable point. Temporary transfers to persons who have bought licensed premises can be issued at any time by the Chairman of the Court. New general -licenses can only issue in June of every year, except at this ensuing December Court. No new l.censes can, we think, be granted at the March Court of 1875, unless the year spoken of by the Act is not the calendar year, but the licensing year ending in June. This is not probably, the reading of the Act whatever the intention might have been. No new application can be granted by the Court if any portion of the premises for which a license is asked is used as a retail store or shop. A new application for an old house is not, we • think, a new application for a house the license for which was refused previously, for the police are instructed to report on " all new applications and new applications for old houses," as to the conduct and management of the house during the past twelve months— clearly implying that an unbroken license has been continuously existing. A "new application for an old house " is probably an application by a buyer or transferee for a license in a new name for an old house. If not the preventing fact of a shop or store might be got over in the case of an old house previously at one time licensed. Weseould hold, however, that all houses— the licenses for which were cancelled 'at the last Court — would, if reapplied for, come under the heading of new houses. These are the principal points which willwnterest district applicants. We do not profess to give a legal opinion, but merely suggest the difficulties that _will li&ve to be coped with by doubtful applicants who had better make sure of being well advised beforehand. The objections raised some time back by the "Guardian" may be dismissed, we think, as the Act condones all imperfect grants, aud fully incorporates, by an unrepealed. clause of the original Act, a licenses that can be granted under Provincial Ordinances that are not antagonistic. We have no doubt night licenses can he quite legally granted by the Board if applicants give due notice of application. The fees to be paid will be for six months — the licenses expiring on the 2nd Julyi 1875. Renewals will have to be applied for in Jun,e next,"