LAND COMMISSION.

Gisborne Times, Volume XVIII, Issue 1477, 10 June 1905, Page 3

LAND COMMISSION.

v • Per Press Association. Stratford, last uight. Tho Whangauiomono settlors are for warding to the Jjaud Commission a length. doounaent, sotting forth that owing to th Commission’s hurried trip tho settlors wori deprived of voioing thoir views as com pletely as tho South Islanders. They non lay their views before is in this form. The "A settlers ask for tho option of tho froohold , on tho ground that lease in porpotuity is ' not equivalent to tho freehold, as represented, and if the State still oousidors tho lease in perpetuity superior to tho froohold , it cannot honestly claim tho price for a A . ohanga of tenure. Several other reasons ? j are given to show the justice of the request / for the freehold. Tho importanoe of pushing on the work of railway completion and roading is emphasised.

THE SITTING AT HASTINGS. > Napier, last night. e„r The Land Commission sat to-day at ' ii Hastings. W. E. GrifHn, land valuer, thought that i* most of the desire for the right to purchase arose from the fear of revaluation, but he ‘ considered this would bo unfair, though it would not be fair to allow settlors to seoure the froehold of their sections at the ' / Original valuation alter the value had M greatly increased. He approved of a settlor being allowed to pay off in reduction j of the oapital value of say one-third, so that his interest might bo reduced. (Robert Wnllwood, farmer, Raureka I Tfjwnas S. Percivai, farmer, Makora > I Thomas J. Thompson, farmer, Mahora I Eustace Lane, farmer, Argyll; and James I A. Kerr, farmer, Lindsay settlement, all I advocated that the right of purchase of the I freehold should be given. I Archibald Lowe, farmer, Mahora, and James Hawthorne, farmer, Mahora, ex- I pressed themselves as satisfied with the J system of lease-in perpetuity. | E. C. Gold-Smith, Commissioner of j Crown Lands, said he knew of no agitation I amongst Crown tenants for the freehold. 1 If suoh had sprang up it must have bsen I 1

recently. The grooping system.of ballot- . log was in his opinion a very bad one, and " ! v- he knew of several people who would have made good settlers who would not apply because they feared they might be compelled to take a section they did not want. .The Commission sits at Pahiatua toA: (.morrow.