Title

Preamble.

Whereas it is expedient to make better regulations in regard to Sales by Auction and Auctioneers and for that purpose to amend the law relating thereto within the Province of Otago:—

Be it Therefore Enacted by the Superintendent of the said Province with the advice and consent of the Provincial Council thereof as follows:

Interpretation Clause.

1. In the construction of the provisions of this Ordinance the following terms shall have the meaning hereby assigned to them that is to say:

The terms "sales by auction" or "to sell by auction" when used in this Ordinance shall mean and imply the selling of any goods chattels articles or things or of any lands or other real estate or any interest in any goods chattels articles or things or any lands or other real estate by outcry knocking down of hammer candle lot parcel instrument machine or any other mode whereby the highest or lowest bidder is the purchaser and whereby the first person who claims the goods or article submitted for sale at a certain price named by the person acting as auctioneer as the purchaser or where there shall be a competition for the purchase of any article goods chattel matter or thing or any real estate or any interest therein in any way commonly known and understood to be by way of auction:

The term "auctioneer" shall mean and apply to any person who shall sell or attempt to sell or offer for sale or resell any goods chattel article matter or thing or any lands or other real estate or any interest in any goods chattel article matter or thing page 4 or in any lands or other real estate by way of auction as herein defined: and The term "cattle" shall mean and include horses mares fillies foals geldings colts bulls bullocks cows heifers steers calves sheep ewes rams wedders lambs swine mules and asses.

Penalty on selling by auction without license.

2. Any person acting as an auctioneer after the passing of this Ordinance without having obtained a license under the same or under the Ordinance hereinafter recited shall upon conviction for each offence be liable to a penalty not exceeding one hundred pounds and be incapacitated from holding an auctioneer's license for the space of three years.

Mode of application for license; annual meeting for disposing of applications.

3. Any person desirous of obtaining an auctioneer's license for the year one thousand eight hundred and sixty-three shall on or before the second Tuesday in the month of January next ensuing and any person desirous of obtaining such license for any subsequent year shall on or before the first Tuesday in the month of December preceding such year lodge in the office of the Superintendent a notice in writing of his intention to apply for such license in the form in the Schedule A to this Ordinance annexed and shall therewith lodge a certificate of character in the form attached to the said Schedule signed by six respectable householders within the Province.

Notice of application to be Gazetted.

4. A notice of all applications for licenses under this Ordinance stating the names and places of abode of the applicants and the names and residences of the householders signing the certificate required as aforesaid and the time and place when and where the applications shall he disposed of shall be published in the Provincial Government Gazette fourteen days at least before the day appointed for disposing of such applications.

Superintendent may grant or refuse any application.

5. Every such application shall be disposed of by the Superintendent with the advice of his Executive Council at a meeting to be held with open doors and it shall be lawful for any person to object to such application arid for the Superintendent and his Executive Council to enquire into the objections and the evidence thereof and after such enquiry the Superintendent with the advice of his Executive Council shall cither refuse or grant such application.

Licenses to be issued by Provincial Treasurer.

6. When any such application has been granted the Superintendent shall issue a certificate directing the Provincial Treasurer or any other person duly authorised in that behalf on payment of the fee aftermentioned to issue a license to the applicant to carry on and exercise the occupation of an auctioneer and every such license shall be dated the day of its issue and shall continue in force unless previously forfeited as hereinafter provided until the second Tuesday in the month of January in each year.

Fee for license £50 to be paid within twenty eight days.

7. Every such certificate as aforesaid shall be null and void unless the page 5 sum required to be paid for such license be lodged in the office of the Provincial Treasurer or of such other person as may be authorised in that behalf as aforesaid on or before the twenty-eighth day from the date of such certificate and the said Provincial Treasurer or other person as aforesaid shall forthwith after the receipt of every such certificate and payment being made of a fee of fifty pounds issue and register in a book in his office a license as aforesaid and shall cause a notice of the same to be immediately sent for insertion in the Provincial Government Gazettespecifying in such notice the name and place of abode of the person licensed.

Superintendent may authorise special meeting to grant licenses.

8. The Superintendent in the case of any emergency which shall be made to appear to him by memorial may with advice of his Executive Council appoint a special meeting to consider any application for an auctioneer's license but in every such case the same length of notice must be given the same certificate obtained the names of applicants and householders certifying published for the same period and all other matters must take the same course as if the application had been heard and considered at the annual meeting for licensing Auctioneers: Provided that the fee for any license granted at any such special meeting shall be the same in amount as if such license had been granted for the whole year except in the case of any auctioneer having a license at the passing of this Ordinance who upon obtaining a new license for the year 1863 shall pay a fee for the same only in proportion to the period such new license will have to run from the expiry of his current license such new license expiring as all other auctioneers' licenses on the second Tuesday in the month of January in each year.

Night auctions prohibited.

9. Any auctioneer licensed under this Ordinance who shall sell by auction any article goods chattels or real estate after sunset or before sunrise shall forfeit and pay a penalty of not less than five pounds nor more than fifty pounds.

No music or riotous conduct allowed in sale room.

10. Any auctioneer licensed under this Ordinance who shall permit any music to be played in any premises used as a sale room and during the time any sale may be going on or at intervals thereof excepting such as may be necessary for the trial of any instrument about to be sold or offered for sale or shall hold a sale in any unsuitable room or building of which the adjudicating Justices shall be the judges or shall permit any riotous or disorderly conduct in any such sale room shall be liable to any penalty not exceeding ten pounds.

Penalty on unlicensed person pretending to be an auctioneer.

11. Any person not being a licensed auctioneer who shall have any words written painted or inscribed or which may have been written painted or inscribed and not thoroughly obliterated over on or about his house window or premises which shall lead to the belief or supposition that such person is an auctioneer or who shall place or cause to be placed any placard board writing matter or thing in the public view to the intent that it may be believed or supposed that such person is an auctioneer or page 6 that any article matter or thing or any real estate or interest therein is to be sold by auction by such person shall on conviction of any such offence forfeit a penalty of not less than twenty pounds nor more than one hundred pounds.

Publicans not to be Auctioneers.

12. No person holding a publican's license or a wine and beer license nor any person in partnership with any such person shall be competent to hold an auctioneer's license under this Ordinance.

Auctioneers to keep registry of cattle sold by them, and transmit weekly return to Resident Magistrate.

13. Every auctioneer licensed under this Ordinance shall keep a register or book in the form in the Schedule to this Ordinance annexed marked C of all the cattle sold by such auctioneer and a copy of every registry or entry made in such book for the week ending each Saturday shall be transmitted every Monday to the Resident Magistrate's Court nearest to the place of sale of any such auctioneer and if there shall be no Resident Magistrate's Court within two miles of such place then such time for the forwarding of such return shall be allowed as the distance may reasonably require and if any auctioneer shall fail to insert in such registry or book any cattle he may have sold during such week or shall not correctly and truly insert all the particulars required by the form set forth in the said Schedule marked C or shall not transmit a correct copy of such registry or book as hereinbefore directed every such person shall forfeit a penalty not exceeding one hundred pounds.

Registry to be open to inspection.

14. Every such registry or book and copies thereof shall be open to the inspection of any officer or constable of police and to every Justice of the Peace at any reasonable time free of cost and to every other person within the usual hours of business upon payment of the fee of two shillings arid sixpence for every such search provided however that for every such fee such person shall be at liberty to take an extract from any such book of any cattle that may be entered therein.

License how forfeited.

14. Every auctioneer licensed under this Ordinance who has not taken due and proper means to ascertain and record the particulars required to be ascertained and recorded or who has been guilty of such neglect or carelessness as to facilitate the disposal of airy stolen cattle or the escape of any person unlawfully or feloniously obtaining any cattle or has improperly obtained a license contrary to the true intent and meaning of this Ordinance shall in the discretion of any two Justices of the Peace forfeit his license as an auctioneer and such auctioneer shall from thence be deemed and taken to be unlicensed accordingly.

Exemptions from this Ordinance.

16. This Ordinance shall not apply to any person selling by auction any Crown property under competent authority nor to any other sale of property specially ordered under the hand of the Superintendent of th Province or of the Collector or principal officer of Customs nor to any sales ordered by virtue of any writ or process issued by or out of any Court of Law or Justice nor to any sale of any animals impounded according to page 7 law and sold under the impounding law nor to any sales made by or under authority of any municipal body.

Proceedings to be in a summary way.

17. All offences against this Ordinance shall be heard and determined and all penalties in respect thereof shall be recovered in a summary way before any two Justices of the Peace.

This Ordinance to apply to existing licenses.

18. Every auctioneer's license in force at the time this Ordinance shall come into operation shall remain in full force and effect until its expiration by effluxion of time or its forfeiture but shall be deemed to be a license granted under this Ordinance and all the enactments herein contained shall apply as fully to every auctioneer so holding any existing license and to such license as if such license had been granted under this Ordinance.

Auctioneers' License Ordinance 1855 repealed.

19. The "Auctioneers' License Ordinance 1855" shall be and is hereby repealed except in so far as it repeals the Ordinances therein recited and except in respect to the licenses which have been issued under the same.

Short Title.

20. This Ordinance shall be termed and may be cited and referred to as the "Licensed Auctioneers' Ordinance 1862."

Schedules Referred to in This Ordinance.

A.

To His Honor the Superintendent of the Province of Otago.

I, A. B., now residing at ____________ in the said Province, do hereby give notice that it is my intention to apply to the next Annual Meeting for the Licensing of Auctioneers for an Auctioneer's License.

Given under my hand this __________ day of _______ 183

Form of Certificate

To be attached to the above, to be signed by six respectable householders, resident in the District.

We hereby certify that we are well acquainted with A. B., the above applicant, and know him to be a respectable person, and fit to be entrusted with an Auctioneer's License.

B.

Form of an Auctioneer'S License.

Whereas the Superintendent of the Province of Otago hath authorised the issue of an Auctioneer's License to A. B., of_____________under the "Licensed Auctioneers' Ordinance 1862," and the said A. B. hath paid to me the sum of_____________pounds (or the sum proportionate to the period such license page 8 shall have to run). Now I, the Provincial Treasurer (or such other officer as may hare been appointed in that behalf, as the case may be) do hereby license the said A. B. to act as an Auctioneer within the Province of Otago, and this license shall continue in force until the____________day of__________next, provided it be not forfeited in the meantime according to the provisions of the said Ordinance.

Given under my hand________day of_______186

C.