NATIVE LAND LAWS.

King Country Chronicle, Volume I, Issue 5, 23 November 1906, Page 3

NATIVE LAND LAWS.

TO THE EDITOR. SIR,—I presume you are fully acquainted with the state of the laws relating to the Native land, and more especially that in the King Country, and also the interminable trouble that is daily happening with regard to them, and I think your readers residing in the King Country are also fully aware of the hopeless muddle in which they are at the present time. Most people are aware that during the past forty years we have had a fresh Statute to regulate(?) the Native land question, and for the past ten or twelve years the present Native Miniter has been responsible for the hopeless muddle, seeing that he is author or sponsor for the Native Acts for that period, and I doubt very much if he can fathom the various questions that from time to time arise in connection therewith. In 1895, an Act was passed called the Reprint of Statutes Act, the object of which was to revise and consolidate all our old Statutes. Under this Act, Commissioners were appointed good and skfflFul men—who have from time to time presented their reports to Parliament as to the progress of their work. I have just been reading their last report, as presented to the last sitting of Parliament, and among other items, I glean the following: "As regards the various Native Land Acts, they are so complex and involve so many difficult questions of implied repeal, and moreover are so far reaching in their effect on title to land, that we do not feel justified in attempting to consolidate them. We therefore propose to print them all as an addendum, inserting in the proper place in each Act, but in italic type, each specific amendment"' After reading this, I venture to say that comment is superfluous. When a body of trained experts confess the difficulty of understanding them,' what can be expected of the ordinary public. Verbum sap.—l am, etc., LOOKING FOR LIGHT.