Settlement in Back Blocks.

Feilding Star, Volume XIX, Issue 16, 19 July 1897, Page 2

Settlement in Back Blocks.

At the meeting of *he Kiwitea i County Council on Saturday the chairman (Cr Williamson) referred to the number of (selectors who were abandoning their holdings in the Marton Small Farm Block owing to . the extremely rough nature of the land. H« was of opinion that the sections should have been from five hundred acres upwards. There were some forty miles of roads requite! to road a block of 1 2,000 acres ai.d the estimated cost to form them alone was £9000, while the metalling was a big consideration. In fact, the roads would cjst n.O'-e to construct than the ! land was worth, while placing a mw [ on small sections like those in ques- j tion was simply tilling him to go there ', and starve himself and family. It was impossible for a local body to keep | repaired such expensive roads as these. [ The chairman suggested that a recommendation should be made to the Commissioner of Crown Lands that when the forfeited sections are again J offered for sale they should be in larger blocks. Other Councillors agreed with the chairman's remarks, one of them stating t hat the Government had spent £2000 on one of the roads in the block in question and then abandoned it. It was resolved, on the motion of Cr Pemberton, and seconded by Cr Tompkins, That tho Clerk; write to the Commissioner of Crown Lands re cancellation of sections in Marton Hmall Farm Bl< ck and pointed out that this Council strongly urges the Commissioner when releasing or re-selling to make the areas much larger, as a number of settlers are now, and will most likely be, left without outlets, und even should the Government make all roads the amount required for maintenance would be more than tbe rating revenue from the land.