This Act may be cited as the Local Elections and Polls Amendment Act, 1944, and shall be read together with and deemed part of the Local Elections and Polls Act, 1925.

For the purposes of this Act the expression “roll of electors”, in relation to any local authority, means any list or roll which is used or prepared in connection with any election of members of that local authority.

Without affecting any other qualification for enrolment, it is hereby declared that every person of or over the age of twenty-one years shall be qualified to be an elector and to have his name entered on any roll of electors of any riding of a county, or of any road district or subdivision thereof, who possesses a residential qualification, meaning thereby—

Provided that nothing in this subsection shall be construed to entitle any person to have his name appearing more than once on any roll of electors:

Provided also that where any person who is entitled under this subsection to have his name entered on any roll of electors is also entitled to have his name so entered by virtue of his being a ratepayer of any district, his name shall be entered on the roll in respect of that rating qualification only.

It shall be the duty of the Clerk of every county or road district to enter on the roll of electors of any riding of the county, or of the road district or any subdivision thereof, as the case may be,—

Every person who wilfully makes a false statement in any claim for enrolment under this section commits an offence and shall be liable on summary conviction to a fine not exceeding five pounds.

For the purposes of this section a person shall be deemed to reside in the place in which he has his permanent home.

No person shall by virtue of this section have more than one vote at any election.

Nothing in this section shall be construed to entitle any person to vote at any poll of ratepayers other than an election.

Nothing in this section shall be construed to impose any liability on any person for the payment of rates.

Nothing in any of the following enactments, namely:—

Ibid., Vol. III, p. 51

shall, in relation to any election, apply with respect to any ratepayer who, if he had not been a ratepayer, would have been entitled by virtue of section three of this Act to vote at that election.

Section six of the Municipal Corporations Act, 1933, is hereby amended by inserting in paragraph (c) of subsection one, after the words “three months then last past”, the words “or has served outside New Zealand in connection with the present war with His Majesty’s Naval, Military, or Air Forces, or in any British ship which was not a home-trade ship within the meaning of the Shipping and Seamen Act, 1908, and is residing in the ward or borough to which the list relates and is not enrolled by virtue of a residential qualification on any other list or roll of electors of a local authority”.

Without affecting any other qualification for membership, it is hereby declared that every person who is qualified under section three hereof to be an elector of any local authority shall be qualified to be elected or appointed as and to be a member of that local authority, unless he is disqualified under any enactment otherwise than on the ground that he is not a ratepayer.

Every person who at any time after the passing of this Act—

shall, forthwith after the passing of this Act or after the date on which he becomes so entitled (whichever is the later), make a claim in the form prescribed in that behalf under the Municipal Corporations Act, 1933, to be enrolled on that roll of electors.

Every such person commits an offence if, for twenty-one days after the passing of this Act or after the date on which he becomes so entitled (whichever is the later), he fails to become enrolled on the roll of electors, unless he proves that he duly made a claim for enrolment thereon or that his failure to make a claim for enrolment was not due to wilful default.

Every such offence shall be a continuing offence until a claim for enrolment has been duly made.

Every person who commits an offence against this section shall be liable on summary conviction to a fine not exceeding five shillings on a first conviction and to a fine not exceeding twenty shillings on any subsequent conviction.

The burden of proof that a person against whom proceedings are taken for an offence against this section was not a person to whom paragraphs (a) and (b) of subsection one of this section applied at any time when he was alleged to have been such a person shall be on that person.

Notwithstanding anything to the contrary in section forty-eight of the Counties Act, 1920, every county electors roll required by that section to come into force on the first Wednesday in April in the year nineteen hundred and forty-four shall come into force on the nineteenth day of April in that year.

Notwithstanding anything to the contrary in section thirteen of the Municipal Corporations Act, 1933, every district electors roll prepared in a borough, the population of which exceeds five thousand, for the purposes of the general election to be held in the year nineteen hundred and forty-four shall be deemed to be closed at five o’clock in the afternoon of the twenty-ninth day of April in that year.

Except as otherwise provided in this Act, every general election of members of any local authority that is required by any enactment to be held on the third Saturday in May in the year nineteen hundred and forty-four shall be held on the fourth Saturday in May in that year.

Notwithstanding anything to the contrary in this or any other Act, no person shall be incapable of being elected or appointed as or of being a member of any local authority by reason of his employment by that local authority.

For the purposes of this section the expression “local authority” means a local authority within the meaning of the Local Government Loans Board Act, 1926, whether by virtue of section two of that Act, or of any Order in Council thereunder, or by virtue of the provisions of any other Act.

Section twenty-three of the Hospitals and Charitable Institutions Act, 1926, is hereby amended by omitting from paragraph (e) of subsection one the words “or who holds a paid office under any contributory local authority within the hospital district”.

Section twelve of the Local Elections and Polls Amendment Act, 1926, is hereby amended by repealing subsection three, and substituting the following subsection:—

Section eight of the Christchurch District ’ Drainage Act, 1907, is hereby amended by repealing subsection one, and substituting the following subsection:—

So much of the First Schedule to the Local Elections and Polls Amendment Act, 1941, as relates to the said section eight is hereby repealed.

The Christchurch Drainage Board Elections Emergency Regulations 1943 are hereby revoked.

All notices issued, all nominations received, and all declarations of election to office made, in respect of the general election of members of the Christchurch Drainage Board which was required by the Christchurch Drainage Board Elections Emergency Regulations 1942 to be held on the third Saturday in May, nineteen hundred and forty-four, are hereby revoked, and no member of the Board shall be deemed to have vacated his office by reason of any such notice or declaration.

The next general election of the whole of the members of the Christchurch Tramway Board shall be held on the last Saturday in November in the year nineteen hundred and forty-four, and on the same day in every succeeding third year thereafter all members of the Board shall go out of office, and on every such day a fresh general election of members of the Board shall be held.

The Christchurch Tramway District Amendment Act, 1939, and so much of the First Schedule to the Local Elections and Polls Amendment Act, 1941, as relates to that Act are hereby repealed.