GOVERNMENT NOTICE.

Auckland Chronicle and New Zealand Colonist, Volume 2, Issue 7, 20 September 1843, Page 4

GOVERNMENT NOTICE.

Colonial Secretary s Office, Auckland, 6th Sept, 1843. HIS Excellency the Officer Administering the Government directs it to be notified that the Ordinances of the Legislative Council of this Colony, intituled and numbered as below, have been disallowed by Her Majesty. Session 2, No. 6. An Ordinance to provide for the Establishment and Regulation of Municipal Corporations. Session 2, No. 8. An Ordinance for Regulating the Conveyance and Postage of Letters. Session 2, No. 14. An Ordinance to amend an Ordinance entered by the Governor of New Zea and, with the advice and consent of the Legislative Council thereof, S' ;sion 1, No. 2. With reference the disallowance of the above Ordinances, His Ey elleney has been pleased to direct the pub ication, for general information, of the following extracts from despatches received from the Right Hon. the Secretary of State for the Colonies. Municipal Corporations' Ordinance, “The power establishing Beacons and Light Houses is a power which, on the most obvious grounds of public policy, is reserved by the Constitution to the Crown as a prerogative which cannot properly be transferred to any other authority. Maritime disasters of the most formidable kind would probably result from confiding this duty to any body of persons for whose skill and stability of purpose, and adequacy of resources, there was not the most absolute security. But is impossible to ascribe those qualifications to Municipal Corporations still in their infancy, wholly destitute of Naval or Hydro graphical knowledge, composed by popular election, and destitute of any funds But such as may result from local assessments.

“The 7th clause of this Ordinance vests in the Corporation all lands within its limits, with the exception of certain reserves; an exception which would still leave to the Corporation, as their entire property, large and valuable tracts of land, for the borough may include a circle of 14 miles in diameter.

“ The objections to this enactment are conclusive, First—lt is repugnant to the Act of the last session of Parliament for regulating the sale of the waste lands of the Crown in the Aus-

tralian Colonies; and, secondly—it vests in the Corporations property of

the Crown which Her Majesty had not placed at the disposal of the Local Legislature; and, thirdly —it may pesent an opportunity for the improvident waste of a large extent of most valuable land, and takes no effective security whatever against such abuses. “ For these reasons the Queen commands me ,to signify to yoti Her disallowance of this Ordinance, though Her Majesty is. pleased to sanction the en- ! actment of another Lav/, by the Local Legislature for the same general purpose, excluding these objectionable provisions.” Post Office Ordinance. “The Postmaster-General having undertaken the conduct of that service, no place is left for the operation of the Local enactment.” \ Land Claims’ Ordinance. “In my despatch, No. 76, of the Ist ultimo, I informed you that Her Majesty’s decision had been suspended on the Act of your Government, passed on the 25th February, 1842, No. 14, ‘to amend an Ordinance enacted by the Governor of New Zealand, with the advice and consent of the Legislative Council thereof, Session 1, No. 2, for the settlement of Land Claims within the Colony, 1 “I have now to intimate to you Her Majesty’s decision with regard to that Act, and in so doing I think it right to acquaint you generally with the grounds of that decision. “When the British Government undertook to Colonize New Zealand, it was with the distinct intention not to admit that any titles to land could be valid which were not derived from or expressly confirmed by the authority of 1 Her Majesty. “This principle was laid down in Lord Normanby's instructions to you on \ our first appointment to proceed from England to New Zealand, and it was publicly announced in the earliest Proclamations issued, both in Sydney and in New Zealand, on assuming the Sovereignty of those Islands. “It is not niy intention here to discuss the evi’s attendant on the accumulation of land in new Colonies, in the hands of persons without capital, or the means of introducing labour. I consider them to have been sufficiently established by experience to entitle me to assume them as admitted. By the Ordinance of the 9th June, 1841, which has been assented to by Her Majesty, this evil is guarded against by the limitation to 2560 acres, beyond which no grant can be claimed. This restriction the Ordinance now under consideration abandons; and placing no limit upon the size of the grant which each claimant may acquire, might prove the means of exposing New Zealand to those evils which have resulted in other Colonies from throwing large and unmanageable grants into the hands of individuals unable profitably to use them. “ I cannot think that it would be prudent in Her Majesty’s Government to dispense with the direct and wholesome check upon the undue acquisition of land which the lormer Ordinance had imposed, and which from the earliest Proclamations the settlers must! have been led to expect. I feel therefore no doubt, as regards the interest of the Colony at large, that they will be best consulted bv reviving the Ordinance of June, 1841. Feeling, however, the consideration which is due to the interest of the individuals, I will examine, thirdly

“ The provisions of this Ordinance as affecting claimants themselves. “ To many of them, and those too the persons most deserving of onsideration, viz. a large body of the early settlers, judging by their own representation, it appears probable that its operation would prove most injurious. “ The principle of the Ordinance of June, 1841, was to value the land to

those who had acquired it in timesi v security, and expended labour m j capital on its improvement, at a 7* v rate—and in so doing proceeded upon a perfecty just principle. “That principle the Ordinance of February, 1842, abandons, and placing all parties upon an equality, fixes a uniform price of ss. upon land, whenever, and under whatever circumstances it had been acquired, To the justice of this 1 cannot assent. The price of ss. per acre would be too high for those to whom by the graduated scale it would have been valued at 6d., and too low for those to whom it would ha v e been valued at Bs. “ Under such circumstances I need hardly observe, that it became my duty to advise Her Majesty to disallow; and Her Majesty is accordingly pleased hereby to disallow this Ordinance. “It follows that you will be guided in future by the provisions of the enactment of the 9th June, 1841, which will of course be revived by the disallowance of the Act which repea'ed it.” By His Excellency’s Command, (For the Colonial Secretary,) WILLIAM CONNELL.