STATE LEASES IN PERPETUITY. Not Long Enough for Some People.

Free Lance, Volume IV, Issue 160, 25 July 1903, Page 8

STATE LEASES IN PERPETUITY. Not Long Enough for Some People.

TIE ciy of the fat man lslieaid in the land, and it is the land he feels hurt about. New Zealand is slipping away from the conventionalism of the old lands, and it has almost become the fashion for the people to really believe that they hold the country for themselves jointly, and in. trust for future New Zealanders. The fat man, seeing his sacred privileges thus slipping away, advances reasons many tons in weight proving conclusively to himself that Crowai leasehold is a delusion and a snare, and showing that the freehold is the only correct thing to further swell his own waistcoat. * * * The conversion of State leaseholds in perpetuity into freeholds would be not only unfair, but a breach of faith, both with the people as a whole and the public creditor. The purchase of land for settlements wasn't done for one man or two. It was done for the people with money that is being paid for by the people throughout the colony, and the proposition to legalise the purchase outright of land, which has been made more valuable under the existing system is distinctly cool. The title a settler may have for his land at present is as good a title as a man need have who does not want the earth for a sheep run, and the moon foi a lambing paddock. * * # Suppose the Crow n tenants* of this colony were granted the freehold. The State has done with them. The tenant, having full power of sale over his land, can dispose of it to the highest bidder , the highest bidder, if he pays enough, can own the countryside You will bleed the worst class of land jobbers under the system The highest bidder having garnered m the countryside, may be made to disgorge by the Government, at a price, under the Public Works Act, and the Government may cut the land up^ and grant freeholds to another little lot of genuine settlers or land jobbers, as the case may be. That is what the Government would have to do if it wanted to act squarely w ith the people * * * We cease to be democratic or fair when we put immense powers into the hands of a small section of capitalists. As a matter of fact, we want no men m the colony who can buy up huge tracts of country which they may leave idle (subject, perhaps, to the thorn in the side of the idle holder, the unimproved value rating). The man the State wants for its re-purchased estates is the perpetual leaseholder, who has a sufficient title to the land, which the Crown always owns, to make it worth while to improve to the uttermost for his own benefit and the benefit of his successors and posterity as a whole.