LAND COMMISSION
'('Pen Press Association.) Dunedin, laßt night, The Land. Commission eat at Dunedin this morning, and took the evidence of John Askew Scott, editor of the Otago Liberal and representative of the organised workers. Witness said he had been appointed to give evidence on behalf of the Trades and Labor Council and affiliated unions. Speaking generally, the Council were against the Crown granting the freehold ; firstly, because they considered it was opposed to public policy, and, secondly, because they considered it a breach of faith with the State. They looked upon the laws of the colony as being of a family estate of New Z'ealand, and felt that the Crown was exercising its functions when it acted as trustee of that estate. The sale of Crown land, acquired by the Crown should be stopped, and in future all laud owned or administered by the Crown should be leased at a fair rental and made subject to periodical valuation. The workers were opposed to any extension of the freehold on the ground that the freehold and the landlord system was a great bar to the progress of the great mass of the people, and one great factor which kept them from reaping the full benefit of the progressive legislation that had been passed on their behalf.
Permanent link to this item
https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/newspapers/GIST19050328.2.33
Bibliographic details
Gisborne Times, Volume XVII, Issue 1415, 28 March 1905, Page 3
Word Count
216LAND COMMISSION Gisborne Times, Volume XVII, Issue 1415, 28 March 1905, Page 3
Using This Item
The Gisborne Herald Company is the copyright owner for the Gisborne Times. You can reproduce in-copyright material from this newspaper for non-commercial use under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International licence (CC BY-NC-SA 4.0). This newspaper is not available for commercial use without the consent of the Gisborne Herald Company. For advice on reproduction of out-of-copyright material from this newspaper, please refer to the Copyright guide.
Log in