THE LAND BILL

Dominion, Volume 14, Issue 23, 22 October 1920, Page 8

THE LAND BILL

MINISTER EXPLAINS HIS MEASURE I FREEHOLD OF THE ENDOWMENT LANDS PROVISION TO BE EXTENDED The Minister of Lands (Hon. D. H. Guthrie) moved the second reading of the Land Bill in tho House of liepresentatives last night. He said that the Bill had been before the Land Committee, which had taken evidence, and [recommended, after very careful consideration, that tho Bill should bo allowed to proceed. Tho measure dealt with matters that were of vital importance to itho country at the present time-. The most important points dealt with the concession of tho freehold to certain tenants of- State-owned land. There might bo diversity of opinion oil some points. But lie thought, that the House would recognise the Bill to be an honest attempt to 'improvo the land laws and place thein in better accord with public opinion,. The Minister'proceeded to explain the clauses of the Bill.

The proposal to offer Crown lands at Auction on defended payments, as woll as for cash, was bound to be of great help to many people of small means. Towji' and suburban lands wero .to bo treated in the' same way. The lands covered by this provision wero sold only for cash at tho present time, and this undoubtedly had debarred the man of small means from buying, specially in cases where there were substantial improvements. The deferred payment ays-' tem was to apply also to settlement lands.

The administration of the land laws in rocent years had given, preference to soldiers in virtually all oases. Civilians with families hnd been blocked from getting on to Crown land. An order of preference was now being proponed to include landless applicants with children, landless applicants who, had been twice unsuccessful at hrtljots, and returned soldiers of the Expeditionary Porco and other forces engaged in the Great War. The returned soldiers would cuntmue. to have first preference under the repatriation scheme. But men who had entered other occupations after discharge ami then wished lator to get on tho land would hav<> the benefit of tho new preference clause. The Government recogr.ised the justice of giving a preference to .men with families and to men who hvl been unsuccessful at several hallo's.

The widening of the power of the Government to make.exchanges of land was coLsidered to bo desirable. The land boards had found that many areas of land could not bo dealt with satis' fnctorily in n"y other way Provision was being made for the surrender of portions of sections held under the o.r.p- tenure. The presont law did not allow a licensee to surrender anything lew than tho whole block. But experience had shown that many men had taken up more land under this tenuro limn they oould work, and it was to .tho ad^outage of tho State as well as of the licensee that these men should be allowed to return the surplus land to tho Lands Department, which could use it in other ways.

The lessees of small grazing runs wero being given additional protection Tho arbitrators provided Tor in the Bill would fix the value of the lessee's improvements. Then the Department would fix the rent to be paid on the basis of the unimproved value. He had made it clear to the lessees that the intention of tho Government was to protect their interests in cases where subdivision became nnoesr eary. The Government must have t'lio sairiG right, to subdivide leasehold lands as it possessed in relation to freehold lands'. The lessee would have his choice of tile allotments in the evant of subdivision, and it was mnde clear that the leswo was entitled, to the valuo of his improvements, and to the valuo of the riglil of renewal that he might have possesses. An. amendment intended ; to secure firmly v the lessee's right to his goodwill would be introduced in Committee.

Provision was being made for takinß soma land from tho national endowments „n<l settling it on the freehold tenure. This provision was needed in order that certain poor lands requiring considerable development' might be settled under the homestead system. This applied to unoccupied endowment land up to 10,000 acres. Tt was proposed also to give any returned soldier who occupied national endowment land the right to the freehold'. Ho would move ni Ominittoo that this Tight to acquire the freehold should be extended to other tenants of national endowment land. If it was right to (five one class of tenants the privilege of the freehold, it was equally right to make the concession to other classes. The State was going to lose nothing 1111 tier this arrangement. Much of the national endowment land was idle at the present time, and if it could bo made n'bductive the Dominion would, benefit The nioney received from purchasers of national endowment land would be invested and would give the State a better return than was now being received. It might be put into suburban land, where values were increasing rapidly. A clause increasing from 5 to 15 acres the area of endowment land that might bo sold for public, purposes was required to meet the needs of various _ districts. The extension of the provision as to postponement of rental had boen found to be necessary in cases of severo fire or flood. The removal of the restriction on equality of exchange in connection with exchanges of private land and publie land was another provision that had been found to be necessary in the course of administration. The Government was proposing' that tenants who secured a reduction of rent after applying for a revaluation should be required to pay the difference ibetween the old rent and the new rpnt to the Lands Department if the land was subsequently sold at a profit. The position was that some tenants had asked for re-, valuations, on the ground that their rents were too high, and had secured reduction of rent. Later had sold out at price 3 that proved tho reductions o ; rent not to have been justified. The Bill protected public interests in such cases. The extsnsiou for five years of the right-of-lease-in-perpetuity tenants to tak- the freehold was an act of justice. The right had lapsed in 1918, while many tenants were away at the war, and others were handicapped by war conditions. The men who had not been able to exercise their right before 1918 would be able tx> buy the freehsld now. lhgre was no compulsion about tho clause,'aim the man who wished to continue his lease would be at liberty to do so The Bavment mad*- to members of land boards was being increased from 20b. to Ms. tor oneh meeting. These men had been losing money on their public duties in most Cn The last clause of the Bill provided machinery for the investigation of cases nf wrongful acquisition of land. The Government was aware that tho laws against aggregation had be<n broken and that land had been acquired unlawfully n other ways, but the enforcement of laws had proved to be a matter of »- ,iiffipultv Th-a Rill would help £ check evaskms. The penalty proposfreehold anu (Merenl some other meinue view, tto the point. He believed 'that the 1 Bill would be the means of mal in" a substantial improvement in Vb"'d laws of the Dominion. £v,o Trader of the Opposition (Mr. 1. M asked if fho Government "the'position they had occupied" prior to the legislation of 1918. . ~ ul' Gilford proceeded to state that the Government had been guilty of a breacn ( foiKh in regard to those lonsos. lhc eUM the land on definite terms including tho payment ot a rental calculated at 2] per cent, on the unimproved value, with perpetual _ right ot r»- , nowal. Tho highest Court in the land,

the Privy Council, had upheld tho rights of these tenants after the Government had contested right through the Courts the claim made by' Mr. St. leger, a Poverty Bay lessee. This lessee had won his case, and had been granted his legal rights. But the Government had broken its jcontract with lessees who had leases similar to that lie" by "r, St. I.eger. That case had been a test of the rights of tenants, and the Government had taken away by the legislation of 1918 a right that had been clearly established by the decision not only of the highest Court in New Zealand, but of the highest Court in the Empire. ' The tenants had gone to great cxpenso to have their right? tested, and the Government had afterwards voided those I'ijhts.

In his statement regarding the sale of lands on deferred payment, the Minister had omitted an. important fact. The clause provided for the issue .of the license to occupy upon payment of a fivo per cent, deposit; but it was not made clear that directly tho agreement of sale was entered into there was a fairly heavy stamp duty to pay. That would be a charge additional to the five per cent, deposit. For tho improvement of the clause dealing with order of preference land ballots, Mr. Wilford suggested that returned 6oldiers should be mentioned first and that the two classes of "landless applicants" should como second nnd third. In the clause authorising disposal by auction of limited areas of Crown land deemed unsuitable for separate holding, the Minister had. failed to define the principal terms he had used, and tho speaker considered that the clause should be made clearer in order to avoid a crop of law cases. In regard to tho national endowment, he had 12 years ago movtid a resolution that wholo. of theso lands should be sold for settlement and that the proceeds should be invested in laud, 6ay, in the mam streets of a city, and permanently earmarked for the purposes of the endowment. 7he,vhole question of selling endowment land, he continued, arose because the Government would not take land compulsorily for soldier settlement I or any other form of settlement. In its soldier settlement scheme the Government lin.d 1 not realised at first that it was letting loose on the counrv men who, with tho money paid by tlio Government, were going to buy up three TTmes the area they had previously held and were by their operations ooidb to Toivc, ira' the vnlittV of land. j Mr. K. S. Williams (Bay of ricntj) said that tho proper tiling to do with the lessees of small grazing'runs would be to jlut them back in the posilioni in which they had been under the 189. Act. (Mr. Wilford: Ileal", hear.) He hoped that the Minister would see his way to bring- 'in legislation with tils object, so that the lessees should not lie deprived of a right they had had undei a contract with the (joveriiment. Mr. W. D. Lysnar (UisbnrneMam ho was glad that something was being done by the Bill to remedy tho position in which tho Poverty Bay runholders had been placed by tho enactment of legislation reversing the Privy Councils decision in the St. Leger case. The Hon. A. T. Ngata (Eastern Maon) asked Just what the Government was doing for the runholders in question. Mr. Guthrie: Wo arc giving them the right to acquire the freehold. ■ Mr. F. F. Hockley (Kotorua) said that as far as the national endowment tenants•wore concerned, he would like their dilfi-, cnlties to bo known to the House, those tenants were mostly peoyle of slender resources who were upon poor land. Hii>v soon came to tho end of their resources, and the land went out of production because nobody would advance money to them. \ If the policy of the Bill in regard to the endowment was extended, lie would support it. In regard to , the grazing run lease, he thought it was qpen to any layman to infer from the wording that the holders had not hnd tho right of renewal at 2J per cent. The words were "not less than -2i per cent. Mr. Hoekly was sanguine regarding •the prospects of pumice country. He thought that the Minister should not overlook such land when setting aside areas under the homestead svtem. Mr. W.- T. Jennings (Waitomo) spoko of mistake,? made in the classification of land. He knew of lands that had been pronounced by the surveyor to be ateless for settlement, but were selling today for high prices. Ho believed that the pumice lands were going to prove a surprise if proper steps.were taken to ilnvelop them. . The Minister in charge of the Bui ob-. served that it would be no surprise to him to see these lands turn out well. Mr. Jennings said that '.he v. freehold issue had been fought out years ago, when the strong9st advocates of the leasehold tenure had gone through the country proclaiming their principles. Some .of them were dead now, and the others were'not in Parliament. Certain men, while they would have nothing but the leasehold tenure, had trafficked extensively in freehold lands in the Kin? Country. Mr. Jennings gave the Minister credit for having niauo an honest attempt, to deal with difficulties. Mr. G Witty (Ricearton) condemned the proposal to part with national endowment land. He contended thai, the Government was "breaking a compact. Tho Minister pretemW that lie wanted only 10,000 acres, which he had the right to take already without any Bill; but he meant to take another million acres that were not mentioned in the Bill at all. This land, the speaker understood, was for returned soldiers: and he would have no objection to the soldiers getting the freehold of the land if only there were a provision ensuring that it would nob , pass out of the soldiers' hands and serve merelv tp enrich people who were already wealthy. Mr. G. Mitchell (Wellington South) wished to see South African veterans 'mentioned in the clause that, gave certain classes of 'applicants (including returned soldiers) preference over all other classes at land ballots. Ho thought there was plenty of land other than national endowment land of which the soldiers might be offered the freehold. He did not think the soldiers wanted the freehold of endowment land. The returned soldiers seemed to be the stalk-ing-horse used to help others acquire the freehold of endowment land. The Hon. J. G. Coates, replying to the statements of Mr. Mitchell regarding the soldiers, pointed to disadvantages suffered by returned soldiers who 'required advarices, but could not get the money because they had not the freehold. He did not by any means endorse tne alegation tlwit the soldiers did not desire the freehold.. Mr. T. W. Rhodes (Thames) thought that if some of . the people who ufged that every aero of national endowment land should be retained could travel round the country and 6ee the land, they would soon change their opinion, v • Mr. A. Harris (Waitemata) said there wero in his district aToas of compare-' tivelv poor national endowment land that could oe brought into production only by tho •expenditure of a considerable amount i>f money. For such land the (freehold tenure was tho onjy fuseM one.

.•Mr. J. It. Hamilton (Awoirua) ridiculed tho suggestion, that in selling the national endowment land ' the Government was "giving it nway." From tho land sold, the Government was goingto get taxation, while tho land was going to become far more productive. Tho advocates of the leasehold tenure wero either people who had a freehold for t.liomselves and wanted the other- follow to have the leasehold, or were people who knew nothing of the conditions under which men worked on the land. Mr. 11. E. Holland (Hullnr) said there was too much exploitation going on in this country in connection with land. He would refuse to permit men to hold laud if they did not make use of it. Mr. Jlussey: You' have that in the Land and Income Tax Bill of this year. Mr. Holland said ho did not think so. He ,was Iprepared to admit, lion-over, tlwt eomo of the legislation brought down now was more progressive than former legislation. He proceeded to condemn the ealo of the endowments. Tho debate was continued after midnight by other members. The House went into committee on ■the BSU, and after passing ti'6 first clause adjourned at 12.15.

Tho Legislative Com"-il yesterday concurred in ithe • anomiinents introduced by Governor-Goneral's Message into the Civil List Bill (No. 2),' when that measure w«b before the Lower House. The Death Duties Amendment Bill and the Gaming Amendment Bill (No. 2), as passed by the.House of Representatives, wore yesterday read a first time in the Legislative Council.