The magistrate on the bench at Newtown court must have realised that it was going to be an interesting morning when he noticed that one of the cases to be heard was a plaintiff named " Meow Meow ". In fact his full name was " Meow-Ludo Disco Gamma Meow-Meow - and he was not a cat ! He had previously been known as Stuart McKellar and he was a a body hacking scientist who hailed from Texas.
Curiously, he was charged with travelling without a ticket and failing to show a ticket to a NSW train inspector. That is despite successfully tapping on and tapping off on the states Opal card system when he travelled by train, by way of the Opal card chip which he had had implanted under the skin of his left hand in 2017.
He had indeed paid his fare but for strange reasons the authorities decided to fall back on an old law that was still on the books from the time of paper tickets needed for each journey. In todays world that Opal card is the ticket - and it must be produced when required.
Despite the NSW transport system moving to accepting credit cards and mobile phone payments on Opal readers, they decided this implant was unlawful. So - as he was unable to produce a visible card, he was charged with an offence and the state flick passed it to the magistrate to sort it out.
The Beak stuck to the letter of the law and fined him $220 and ordered him to pay $ 1000 costs, but recorded no conviction. To add insult to injury, that Opal card chip has been cancelled and this should serve as a warning to travellers thinking of adopting twenty-first century technology to avoid the loss of Opal cards. The state takes a dim view of implants !
On the subject of court fines, the many owners of small businesses in this state will find it almost unbelievable that in France you can be fined for working too hard. The French have laws that insist that every citizen has recreation and to achieve this they must take one day off each week.
It seems that a baker in a holiday area was so inundated with requests from tourists for fresh croissants and baguettes that he was working seven days a week in the holiday season. He ran foul of local labour laws that dictate and insist that local businesses work only six days out of seven. He was hauled into court and fined the Australian equivalent of $4744.
Of course, we once had very restrictive laws that dictated who could open on weekends and what merchandise could be sold but all that has passed into history. Small business owners and their families are accustomed to seven day trade and even a few hours off work is regarded as a bonus.
No doubt that French experience will weight on the mind of many small business proprietors as they roll up the shutters and prepare for a busy day serving the tourist trade. They will also remember the anger back in the days when the law prevented them from opening on a Sunday !
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