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Bill . . STS
PUBLIC HEALTH ACT.
' AN UNUSUAL CASE.
WER OF COUNTRY JUSTICES
- DISMISSED.
A point under the Public Health Act
of some interest to local) authorities was
decided on appeal yesterday by His
Honor, Mr. Justice Nicholls.
In April of last year Mr. James Edward
Richardson, of Salt Water River,
in the Tasman municipality, was ill.
He. sent for the nearest doctor, five
miles away, who was also the local
health officer, but his messenger found
that the doctor had that very day left
the district for good. Two days' later
the Local Authority sent another doctor,
who was not the local health officer,
to see Mr. Richardson. According to
Mr. Richardson's sworn affidavit, with ice
was not contradicted by, answering affidavit,
the doctor told him he was suffering
from "an influence cold and re-
lapse and inflamed lung." The doctor
only saw him once and gave him no
notice that he was suffering from an
infectious disease. The Local Authority
also engaged a nurse. Mr. Richardson
objected to both nurse and doctor
as unnecessary. The Local Authority
demanded £8 12s. from Mr.
Richardson,.fees for nurse and doctor,
Stating this was a case, of suspected typhoid.
Mr. Richardson took the written
Opinion of Mr. G. Crosby Gilmore,
who advised that he was not liable to
pay the fees, on the grounds that he
had not engaged the doctor and nurse,
and protested against their services, and
that the Local Authority could only
deem as a debt due the reasonable expense
of maintaining and then find a
patient who was not a pauper in hospital
that Mr. Richardson's private
house was not a hospital, and, moreover,
from what the doctor, had, told
him. he was not suffering from an infectious
disease. This opinion was
given on the 10th of July, 1913. On
the second of March last the Local Authority
sued Mr. Richardson under section
6 of 1 Geo. V., No. 56, for the
18 Ills. The presiding justices at the
Police Court, Premaydena, were Messrs.
John Blackwood and J. Dyson Lacy.
The council clerk (Mr. Eric Heyward)
prosecuted, and Mr. Richardson conducted
his own case' According to his
sworn affidavit, the Bench would not
read the opinion he had taken for their
guidance, and finally made an order
against him For i'S 12s., and £2 2s.
costs), Mr. Richardson decided to no
real. land, of his instructions, on March
7. Mr. G. Crosby Gilmore (Gilmore and
Simpson) obtained from His Honor Mr.
Justice Nicholls an order nisi for a writ
of prohibition calling on the justices to
show cause, why their order should not
he set aside, on the grounds : (1) That
the? conditions necessary to bring section
For 1 Geo. V-., No. cf. into operation
did not exists (2) That the justices
improperly, admitted evidence.
Yesterday, in chambers, the case came
on for argument before His Honor Mr.
Justice Nicholls. Mr. G. Crosby Gil-
more appeared for the appellant, and
Mr. Alan Giblin (Giblin and Piesse) for
the Tasman municipality and the justices.
After argument His Honor up
held the appeal, setting aside the judgment,
of the justices, and making the
order absolute, with costs.
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