THE MOKAU CASE.

Dominion, Volume 5, Issue 1280, 8 November 1911, Page 4

THE MOKAU CASE.

Sir,— I cannot allow the statement.-. irported to have been made b.v tfiv Carroll at Levin on Hie fith to puss without notice; neither do I admit tho excuse made by tho Prime Minister ol sonic wild statements made by Sir.l. I'iiidlny.tliat lit was an "elcotioneeriu;,' speech, as .being jlistilleation for stating what js nor correct. , ~ ~ Sir James. Carroll regrets that Mr. Massoy had thought lit to discuss the Mokau ea'so on the 'platform whilo it was ?übjudice. That may lie an opinion be- ■ twixfc themselves, but there is .tho element that Ml'. Miissev' has proven tho main facts that he submitted irom tho platform, so that tho end would appear to justify tho means. Sir .Tames Carroll appears to have forgotten that when 1. petitioned the House in 11)10, Hansard was 11 indn use of by T)r. i'imlhy in the Couiiei!, while tho petition was sub-judice, to disseminate many statements that were not correct, as well as concealment of facts, and tho Government orgnn employed to abuse me, yet I have never been able to .obtain . tho open inquiry reroinmended by the Legislative Council Committee of 190S, to state my facts for public information. That inquiry wns blocked. l)i. I'indlny denies that ho blocked | it, but tli-e fact remains that it was I blocked. , | Sir .Tames Carroll states that if the Government had bought the laud at .£15,000, tlicy would have been blainetl for giving the Natives too little. This is mero subterfligu. A -deposit was l', n ,, ' and if .£15,000 was found to bo too little, a larger sum could have been advanced. Ho also states that had tho Government bought the land they might' have been assailed by law suits by Mr. Jones, Mr. Hermann Lewis and the Natives. Tjiis is contrary to fact. There was no ilinieulty about tho matter, as stated by mo in ovidence before the Committee of 1911. The Prime Minister and tho Hon. Mr. Carroll have agreed with me and my solicitor in 1910, that as a means of settlement I should (1) surrender all claims to tho leases; (2) that tho Government would then purchase the freehold from tho Natives mid take over tho leaseholds compulsorily under the Native. -Laud. Act" by paying off the mortgagee. (2) That the holder o. tho leases (Lewis), who had not so far paid a farthing for the property, should )» paid under tho Public Works Section of tho Act. (i) That the Government would then concede to me tho working of the minerals under extended leases, and also award to me an area of freehold land for my own ui-es, in consideration of the losses I had sustained, and of tho building by a London company of a harbour at Molam, and working tho minerals (as stipulated by.cable). There was no chanco of litigation—the mortgagees would have taken their money. Lewis had been from the beginning of 1908 to March, 1911, and could not deal with tho property, fie never could have done anything without tho Order-iii-Couneil. Neither would anyone else for the same reason. Had tho Government carried out the agreement with me, it would only have cost tho country some _.Eio,ooo, or, say, a littlo more, if the Natives had been paid in excess of the .C1">,000 agreed upon. In return the Government, irrespectivo of tlie land and minerals awarded to me, would have had a harbour built at Mokau, with soiuo 47,000 acres .upon which to place tenants, with right of freehold, the present tenancies, with ono exception, being illegal. I have reason to believe the Government would havo carried out this arrangement, hut for the influcuco of one member of the Cabinet. Sir .Tames Carroll states that the issuing of tho Order-in-Council was in tho interests of the public. Possibly so. llut in any case it. was one for the public and ten for tho speculator. It does not appear to be generally understood, and may' hero bo stated; that when the name of the alleged purchaser, Lewis, became placed on the land transfer register, and the committee of tho Legislative Council in 1908, recommend&.l the Government to set up inpuiry by competent tribunal into all th circumstances, and meantime to hold the property from further dealings. My solicitor was informed that the Government would not set np the inquiry nor protect tho property as recommended, pertain onerous terms on behalf of Lewis were demanded, which, not boing acceded to by me, lead to a threat that the' case would bo sent to a commission to bo dealt with. A Commission was subsequently issued to Sir U. Stout and Mr. Jackson Palnier, as stated by Dr. I'indlny in Hansard, 1910, p. 599," as part and parcel of a Native land Commission of Inquiry— within which category Mokau was not situated. The Commission,.howevyr, held tho "inquiry," but unknown •'to—me. I heard nothing of it until two„ months after it had taken place. The report condemned my dealings with tho Natives. It stated that I had violated my agreements with them, obtained titles illegally, and contained other statements that wore untrue. lat once wrote to tho Prime Minister, protesting against such proceeding, but received no satisfaction, During tho session of 1909 ft deputation of bon. members waited with me on the Premier when I requested him to remove the report from.; the table of the House, upon tho grounds that, it was a document illegally procured; that I knew nothing of tho inquiry, which had been held behind my back; that the report contained material statements that were untrue, and I asked for the inquiry that had been recommended by Hie Committee of IMS to ho set up. The. deputation nor myself received ■noassurance—the report became hound up in tho Blue Books, and. as stated before, I could never obtain the open inquiry. This Commission report is given by Sir J. Carroll in a paper, laid by him on tho table, as the authority for I! leases being • void .or voidable, and upon which the actions of tho Government in tho recent dealings with these lands havo been based. It now transpires, however—as held bv mo from the onset— that this Stout-Palmer report has been held to be illegal; tho Parliamentary Committee before whom the report was laid to act upon has "ruled it out." Tlireo barristers—Hell, Hoskings, mid Skerrett—havo given tho opinion that the report could not he held applicable to tho Mokau case, and the Chairman of tho Committee that ruled it out stated in the House on October 27 last, if the barristers' opinions had been scrutinised, I would i.ot havo lost tho property, and if this were really so, there could bo no doubt tluit 1 was entitled to some consideration. Sir .lames Carroll was uv.oro of the circumstances; he was on tho committee that ruled out the report; lie look part in the debate in the House; yet he is not reported to have mentioned the facts at Levin, a# was his duty.—l am, etc., J. JONES. November 7.