I do not quite understand how part of it is going to work. If there is only one certificate, how can it be exhibited in different places unless we provide for copies?
SECTION 8.
Question proposed: " That Section 8 stand part of the Bill."
The Deputy's query, as I understand it, relates to the provision that the certificate of registration shall be exhibited in each place where the business is carried on. A certificate is one document. It is an original document, is it not?
As I understand it. I have an original document that I carry on business under the name and style of George Fottrell & Sons. I have never tried for a second certificate.
In the case of a company, the certified copy is the copy kept in the registered offices of the company and should be displayed there.
Has the certificate of incorporation to be displayed?
I think there is something to that effect. It is more honoured in the breach.
Something must be put up to show these are the registered offices of the company.
In regard to the registration of business names, is there a provision in this Bill to allow for the issue of more than one certificate ?
There is in Section 16 (1) (b), which states that any person may require a certificate of the registration of any person or a copy of or extract from any other document, and so on. Each certificate is a certificate in itself, when issued by the Registrar.
Section 16 only allows for the issue of a copy.
No. If I were a doctor, and I certified that the chairman of this Committee was suffering from anaemia, surely I could certify that several times in separate documents, each of them being a certificate ?
I am convinced, anyway.
"In every case . . . where the business is carried on . . ." what exactly does that mean ? Coming back to the question of newspapers, who is carrying on business at a street corner where a newsboy is selling? If the newsboy is a retailer, well and good, but suppose he is an employee of the company, would the street corner be a place of business for that purpose?
Does that happen ?
Suppose for some reason it did.
Like the turnover tax.
You might as well say that a messenger boy on a bicycle has to be registered as soon as he gets off the bicycle and delivers goods to houses.
That is the extreme case. " In every branch office . . ." That is easy enough but " or a place where the business is carried on " is worrying me. Suppose for instance, a sub-printing depot?
That could become ridiculous, say, if an ice-cream manufacturer put out a cart at a street corner.
The wording is in being for half a century now because it is taken from a somewhat analogous provision in Section 108 of the Companies Act of 1908. By usage alone the newsboy at the corner of the street is not in a place of business.
In any event is he not trading under his own name?
It is a place where business is carried on, not a place of business, to make a distinction. As Deputy Gallagher says, there is the question of the mobile shop. It would be fair enough to ask the mobile shop to carry its registration, or to require exhibition of a certificate of registration at any place that is permanently settled, provided there is some permanency about it. If a firm takes a stand at the Horse Show, sells perhaps only leaflets and is there for only a fortnight, it is their place of business. Must it have a certificate ?
Yes.
Must they display or have their certificate? I do not want to be difficult but I think it is the logical implication ?
They hold themselves out as being in business and it might be only fair to the public that they display the certificate.
Even in such a temporary thing as the Spring Show or the Horse Show? Is it reasonable to go that far ?
I should imagine that for strict interpretation and enforcement of the Bill, it would be required, but on the other hand a person who fails to display a certificate of registration there or in such a place is hardly likely to be prosecuted.
I think it must be left to reasonable interpretation.
No. I dislike making a law to be broken if we can avoid it.
It has operated for a long time without leading to this kind of difficulty.
If we go too far with it, surely a traveller out in a car carrying samples is carrying on business from shop to shop. If you take this to extremes, all types of people will be required to carry certificates.
There is an implication of something permanent in " place where the business is carried on " rather than a car or someone going from door to door.
Would you say " where business is habitually carried on "?
I should not like to depart from the words of the 1908 Act. It has covered analogous situations very well.
To voice suspicions that Deputy Sweetman has voiced on other occasions, having regard to the fact that certificates can be issued for a fee—unprescribed—and bring in revenue, I am a little bit doubtful.
I sympathise with Deputy de Valera's point that we should not have a provision to which the blind eye would have to be turned. It is possible that we can get a word—not necessarily " habitually " or " regularly " but some word like that—and I shall try to bring in an amendment on Report Stage.
Question put and agreed to.