MUIR V. MUIR 5/1951

6.3080,

H. J. Gnsew, Government Printer, Melbourne.

"So T95I*O -}

IN THE HIGH COURT OF*AUSTRALIA. €

REASONS FOR JUDGMENT.

Judgment delivered at... K ALL BAAA, —

on... cen tg 6)

ZUDGMENT (ORAT,)

MUIR

v

MUL

DIXON WILLTAMS

MUIR v MUL

JUDGMENT (ORAL) DIXON Je WILLIAMS J. EULLAGAR Js

This is an appeal from an order of Mr. Acting Justice Paine by which he dismissed an appeal from an order of the Court of Summary Jurisdiction mace under the Maintenance Act. The order was made under sec. 66(1)(a) of the Maintenance Act 1926 as amended. It was,of course, made upon the application of the wife. The Magistrate granted to the wife the legal custody of her children, two in number, and he directed the husband to pay to the Children's Welfare and Public Relief Board the sum of £4:10:0 a week. He reserved the question of access and made an order as to costs. The appeal is brought as of right and no objection has been made to the competence of the appeal. Possibly in view of our decision as/the competence of the appeal in Cocks v. Juncken,(1947) 74 C.L.R.277, no objection could properly be made, but we must not be taken to carry that decision any further by entertaining this appeal, in view of the fact that no objection was made.

The Magistrate appears to have acted under paragraph(v) of sec. 66(1)(a) of the Maintenance Act 1926-1950. That paragraph provides that any married woman whose husband in any period during the preceding six months has been guilty of wilful neglect to provide reasonable maintenance for her or any of her children may apply for summary protection under that division and the same may be ordered accordingly.

The Magistrate had before him a long story of matrimonial disputes and bickering and the evidence which the wife gave upon the hearing, if accepted, disclosed a course of condwit on the part of the husband which included a certain number of acts of violence and included other conduct of a description to which a