RESTORATION OF FREE MARKET WANTED BY R.S.A.

Bay of Plenty Beacon, Volume 15, Issue 12, 20 March 1950, Page 5

RESTORATION OF FREE MARKET WANTED BY R.S.A.

The quarterly conference of the Waikato-King Country-Bay of Plenty R.S.A.’s held in Hamilton considered that a free market in land should be restored as soon as the declared purpose of the Servicemen’s Settlement and Land Sales Act had been fulfilled. There was a long discussion on the proposals of the Government to amend the Act, and it swas agreed that the main problem was one of arriving at a reasonable value which would be fair to the vendor and yet a value at which the settler or purchaser could feel satisfied that he had received fair value for his money and an assured feature. '

Until the new basis of valuation to be adopted by the Government was known, the conference considered it to be useless discussing the proposed amendment. It was stressed that unless this new basis was determined quickly, many sales would be lost as now was the time of the year that most negotiations for farms could be expected. A resolution urging the Government to expedite its announcement was passed unanimously. It was contended that if there was an intention to repeat section 51 of the Act entirely it would mean that in most case's an ex-ser-viceman dependent upon rehabilitation finance would not be a popularl purchaser. In fact, it would be likely that the market of single units would be closed to ex-service-men. , :

The New Zealand R.S.A.’s policy was that the Act be amended to provide that, in a sale of the whole of a vendor’s land, the vendor have the right to withdraw from the sale if the price was reduced by the Court, provided that if the vendor sell the land within 12 months after such a withdrawal it should be to another ex-serviceman.