RATES ON NATIVE LAND.

King Country Chronicle, Volume V, Issue 376, 8 July 1911, Page 5

RATES ON NATIVE LAND.

HANDICAPPED COUNTIES. HOW THE LAW ACTUALLY STANDS. Mr H. Marsland, County Clerk, Raglan, writes regarding the enforcei ment of payment of rates by natives as follows:- As the Rating Amendment Act, 1910, repeals sections 89 to 102 of the principal Act of 1908, the consent of the Native Minister is no longer required to enforce a judgment against Maori land for rates. Unfortunately, however, there is practically no improvement in the standing of local bodies in the matter. Section 8 of the Rating Amendment Act, 1910, states:— (1) For all the purposes of the principal Act and of this Act the nominated owners or occupiers aforesaid shall be deemed to re-resent all the owners or occupiers, and accordingly any demand for payment of rates may be delivered to them or any of them, and 3hall thereupon be deemed for all purposes to have been delivered to all of the owners or occupiers. (2) In any action for the recovery of rates in arrear from the owners or occupiers in common of native land, any one or more of the nominated owners or occupiers may be sued as representing all of the owners or occupiers, and any judgment so obtained against any nominated owner or occupier shall be for all purposes be deemed to be a judgment against all the owners or occupiers. From a first glance it would appear that the above amendment to the principal Act had given the local body all it required, and the position would be tfcat it could recover all rates from native land by simply suing the natives who had been placed on the roll as representing the owners of the land, and then enforcing its judgment against the land on the assumption that the judgment against the nominated occupiers was good for enforcement against all the other owners in globo, by sale of the land as a whole. If this was so the position woull be sound, and all that the local bodies ask for. Now let us refer to section 11 of the amendment Act and we find : (1) The owners in common of native land shall not be liable jointly for the total rate payable in respect of that land, but each of them shall be liable for the same proportion of the total rate as the value of his interest to the aggregate value of the interests of all the owners.

(2) Notwithstanding anything in this section, rates payable in respect of native land may be demanded and sued for as if the owners in common were jointly liable therefor. (3) Every judgment so obtained shall operate and be enforceable as a separate judgment against each of tne owners for his own proportion of the total rate an determined by this section, together with a like proportion of the costs of the action. Now the restrictions as laid down by clauses 1, 2, and 3 of section 11, absolutely nullify the provisions of clause 8 a" far as local bodies are concerned, with a very few exceptions. Take a large block of native land which stands on tne county roll in the name of, say, five nominated native occupiers, who probably represent over 100 owners. Well, section 8 allows the local body to get a judgment against all the owners by suing the ones on the roll as occupiers, but when it comes to enforcing such judgment, section 11 confines the local body to recovering from each individual owner his share of the rates as defined by the area he ia entitled to on partition of the block and definition of his shsre. Now, what length of time and what cost would be incurred in enforcing such a judgment. It would take years, as the local body would have to search all over the country for the owners, and in most cases the costs incurred would be greater than the natives' interest. In the Raglan County we have one section of about 120 acres, owned by over 20 natives, so in a case like that what would be the coat of enforcing the judgment against each individual owner? What the Act should have allowed would be to allow the local body, after obtaining its judgment against the nominated native occupier, to realise on the land, take all its rates due under such judgment, and the balance realised to be held by the Crown on behalf of the owners as is the present case with European land. The sale to be conducted as at present by the Registrar of the Supreme Court. Summing up the position generally, the local body, with few exceptions, is just in as bad a position as it was in 1908 under the principal Act with regard to the enforcement of rates due by natives. The exceptions are those blocks of land in which the relative interest of each owner has been defined, and which areas stand solely in the owner's name on the records of the Native Land Court and the county valuation roll. These areas are, iri most cases, unfortunately, very small, and it ia not these that would greatly affect the county revenue, but the large blocks of land. A correspondent in your columns asks the local bodies to unite and agitate for some alteration; well the local bodies have agitated, and some two years ago held a very representative conference in Auckland, and asked for material amendment of the law. Unfortunately the local bodies have received very little assistance from members of the House and Chambers of Commerce. Members of Parliament do not seem to realise the importance of the position to local bodies in the Auckland province and the North Island generally. As the enforcement of rates on native lands really means the opening up of such lands to earn the moneys for payment of such rates it seems to me that this is a matter that the Auckland Chamber of Commerce should give its strongest support to. The local bodies have done all they can, and for a result obtained the rather barren amendments as laid

[ down by the Rating Amendment Act, 1910, and from their point of view the onlj remedy theycan wait for is the gradual acquirement of native lands by the Crown and lease of same to Europeans, who will, pay the rates. To some counties the native rating question is an enormous one. Although Raglan has a lot of native land it still has a large revenue apart from such, but that doaa not alter the fact that the Europeans by metalling roids. etc., are greatly "enhancing the value of native land, to the costs of which works the native contributes nothing. To my mind there is not question of the present day so important to the Auckland province as the above, and I commend it to the urgent attention of our members and chambers of commerce. 'N. Z. I Herald." I