RISE OF LAND VALUES

Hauraki Plains Gazette, Volume 52, Issue 32302, 20 August 1943, Page 5

RISE OF LAND VALUES

(To the Editor.)

Sir,—MJnder such headings as “Land Speculation” and “Speculation Evils,” appear in the press some remarks of the Minister of Health with regard to the mis-called “Servicemen’s Settlement and Land Sales Bill.” Mr Nordmeyer gives the rise in capital value of land between 1912 and 1928 as from £315,000,000 to £618,000,000, about 96 per cent, in 16 years. In talking of land, rural land is to the front; probably not one per cent, of readers think of other than rural land when land values are in question. Firstly, then, exports from New Zealand in 1912 were £21,511,626, and in 1928, £55,570,and had risen 159 .per - cent., so that if the rise in rural land had been that given by Mr Nordmeyer it would have been more than justified. This is not the case. Rural values have been continually stolen. Secondly, the capital values of the counties was £218,282,038 in 1912 and £351,014,323 in 1928, which shows an appreciation of only 44%. Why not go back further? A better case could be made against rural land, in particular, for county valuations increased between 1897 and 1917 from £95,000,000 to £152,000,000. Mr Noi'dmeyer “is reported as having said the mortgages increased in the same period from £88,000,000 to £302,000,000. This is pure, guessing and if the Prime Minister’s Department gave these figures to the Minister those responsible should be hauled over the coals. It is. not possible to say what mortgages are really operative at any date and particularly with regard to rural land subjected to many changes of ownership. New mortgages are registered, and the fee is paid, but land abandoned or reyerting to original owner is not deregistered, as this costs money. Mr Nordmeyer has given incorrect figures. Some Land Transfer figures may be given from the Year Books relating to town and country mortgages from 1916. (Rural and town mortgages were not previously distinguished from one another). In 1916, 4872 town acres were mortgaged for £2,395,963, an average of £491 per acre. In 1917, 530 fewer town acres were mortgaged for £4,215,266, or £970 per acre. In 1918, the average was £796, but in 1919, post-war cutting up had commenced and 18,742 acres -were secured-against £3,351,593; next year 43,398 against £9,726,821; in 1921, at the height' of the boom, 66,224 acres were mortgaged for £16,133,642. There was no such “war years’ ” increase in mortgaging of rural areas—the 1916 acreage being 4,608,014 for £16,032,809, an average of £3 9s 7d, the acreage mortgaged dropping yearly to 2,830,260’ acres in 1919, but 1920- registered an increase in 6,050,551 acres secured for £30,943,226, an average of £3 2s Id per acre, and the avreage rose in 1921 to 6,821,808, secured for £39,948,328, equal to £5 17s Id per acre. That was the end of high values for farm lands and in two years the amount secured per acre dropped to £2 Is 6d. In 1929, just before the slump, rural mortgage value per acre was only £3 9s 10d, over a lesser acreage and a million less money than in 1916, but by 1929 town mortgages were secured for a larger sum than rural mortgages, (£15,432,011), an average of £2075 per acre, against the £491 of 1916. The amount secured per acre against seven per cent, fewer rural acres in 1929 than in 1916 was £3 9s lOd, comparing with £3 9s- 7d in the former year, but town acreage placed under mortgage had increased by over 52 per cent, in area and the amount secured against each acre by 322 per cent.. When electioneering talk begins the Government party will boast of its work to secure “justice” for men placed on the land. As the figures I have already produced and many others that could be given, show, the increase in productivity of the land does not secure the farmers’; equity and no shaving of rural land values will greatly improve the new settlers’ of success.

The Opposition speakers will claim that the Government has flogged the farmer, but that they had succeeded in reducing the number of stripes. The truth is that the new bill does not touch the problem and that of all the economic causes that reduce the value of land that is producing more, State action is the greatest. Even railway freights are loaded against the farmer and more heavily on those who are least able to bear them. Much nonsense is talked by politicians about railage freight subsidies. The truth is that the original railway rates were imposed under the idea

that railways assisted most those outback and that the.back-blockers should pay, and they have been paying ever •

since . A re-arrangement of railway charges on a sensible basis would', for instance, do more to assist new settlers than any juggling with prices of land. At present, wool pays 4.5 Id per ton mile, while fish returns 2.38 d per ton mile. Reducing freight charges, provid- ■ . ing electricity, telephones, roads and refraining from making out-back settlers provide reading amenities for ' others by means of a rating system that is assisting one blade of grass to grow where two grew before, - i would not only benefit New Zealand and provide a broader base for the ?, 4 national economic structure, but would ? indicate that, at long last, a sensible : approach to the farming question was being made by Parliament. /"/SAfl As the national course is set, noth- ’ ir.g can happen but the gradual impoverishment of farms, the shrinkage of the area that can 'be farmed eeonomically and ultimately a reduced standard of living for New 'Zealand, / J a country the population of which exists on grass, despite all dispute, and ; would gain greatly by every two ’ ’>J blades grown where one grew before, p but prefers to consume the grass be- ' y fore it is sown.—l am, etc., : f A. E. ROBINSON, Provincial Secretary,Auckland -Province, N.Z. Farmers’ ■ Union. ’ ' ' | !jll