MORTGAGE RELIEF

Hokitika Guardian, 15 November 1933, Page 6

MORTGAGE RELIEF

WEAKNESS IN PRESENT LAW

EXPERIENCE OF COMMISSIONS

WELLINGTON, November 13

. Certain weaknesses in the present law dealing with mortgage relief have been revealed by the experience- of mortgage relief commissions in New Zealand during the past, two years. Amendments will be introduced before this session of Parliament ends. x\t the same time, the remaining legislation ’dealing .with the subject will be consolidated and the whole system placed on a unified basis. When tlie original Act was passed, two jears ago, the Government had, no precedents to go on, and it was only by experience that defects in the Act could be detected.

Evidence of tlve important part mortgage adjustment commissions have played in the life of the community during the past two years is to be found in tlie official figures to the end of September. These show that 6900 applications for reconsideration of interest bad been received, and of these between 5000 and 6000 were dealt with. Remissions granted represent a sum running into millions. The 'actual figures do not reveal the full position, for. with the knowledge that the provisions of the Act could be utilised, many parties have come together privately and made adjustments of mortgages without havirig to call upon the machinery provided. The greatest number of apolioations hud come fiom the Wellington district, with Canter-bury-Westland second, North Auckland third, Taranaki fourth, Hawke’s Bay fifth and Otago sixth. There are two purely city commissions, one for Wellington and one for Auckland, and the number of cases dealt with by the Wellington commission greatly exceeds that of Auckland.