Poverty Bay Standard. PUBLISHED EVERY TUESDAY, THURSDAY AND SATURDAY MORNINGS. GISBORNE : TUESDAY, AUGUST 7, 1883.

Poverty Bay Standard, Volume XI, Issue 1339, 7 August 1883, Page 2

Poverty Bay Standard. PUBLISHED EVERY TUESDAY, THURSDAY AND SATURDAY MORNINGS. GISBORNE : TUESDAY, AUGUST 7, 1883.

We are pleased to hear that little opposition is anticipated to the Native Land Laws Amendment Bill, as there can be no doubt but what it is a step in the right direction. Clause 4 wisely provides that every Native must personally appear in the Native Lands Court in support of hie claim, and in no case shall he be permitted a legal representative. The only divergence from this rule is when a person, through sickness, infirmity, old age, or unavoidable absence, or when present is unable to conduct his own case, then and then only is he permitted to appear by a Native proxy. This clause alone is calculated to meet many abuses and much cross dealing. Clause 5 enables the Court to dispense with any clogging legal formalities, and to take the best ways and means it may consider advisable for ascertaining and determining the ownership of Native lands This clause cannot be too highly commended as it must be clearly apparent to all that Native customs, and not our law, is the thing to be considered in ascertaining and deciding the title and ownership of Native lands. Clause 6 provides that no one shall after the passing of the Act, negotiate for the purchase, lease, exchange, or occupation of any Native land, or any estate, right, title, or interest therein until thirty days after a proclamation has been issued by the Governor and gazetted, which shall be within six months after the issue of the certificate of title. Clause 7 imposes a penalty of £5OO upon any one who shall, before the expiration of such notice, take or accept any conveyance, lease, transfer, gift, or other assurance whether to himself or himself and others, of any Native land, or be a party to any negotiation, agreement, contract, or promise to himself or others, 'he penalty to be recoverable in a summary way ; and every such conveyance, lease, transfer, gift, or other assurance, agreement, contract, and promise shall be null and void, save and except where the Supreme

I Court ehall make an order otherwise. Clause 8 provides that it shall be the the especial duty of Trust Commissioners to inquire into and ascertain if any such negotiations as aforesaid were commenced or carried on after the passing of this Act, and before the day fixed by proclamation. Clause 9 directs that Trust Commissioners shall upon being satisfied that this Act has been infringed, endorse on the principle or only instrument, a certificate under hie hand, which shall be an effectual bar to the registration of such deeds or lands, the Supreme Court alone being empowered to reverse and expunge such order and endorsement. Clause 10 enacts that nothing contained in the Bill shall affect the validity of any conveyance, lease, gift, transfer or other assurance .after registration under any Act relating to tne registration of deeds or lands ; but this provision shall not abate the liability of any person to any pecuniary penalty. Clause 11 states that “ The Native Lands Frauds Prevention Act 1881, shall hereafter be read and con strued as though 0,7, 8,9, 10 and 11 of this Act had been incorporated and formed part of the said Act.” Clause 12 exempts the Crown, or any person acting for or on behalf of the Crown, under the authority of a Minister, from all the provisions of the Act. Clause 13 sets forth that the Maori Real Estate Management Act, 1867, and the Maori Real Estate Act Amendment Act, 1877, shall be henceforth read and construed as though there were expressed therein the following provisions: “ All monies to become payable under the said Acts, or under any contracts made thereunder, shall be paid to the credit of' au account to be opened forthe purpose by the Public Trustee, whose receipt alone shall be a good discharge to any person paying the same, and whose certificate alone shall be recognised by any Trust Commissioner as evidence of any payment having been made under the said Acts, and such Public Trustee shall not pay any money out of such account without the written authority of a Judge of the Native Lands Court.” Clause 14 repeals section 10 of the Maori Real Estate Management Act, 1877, and provides that both that and the Native Land Act Amendment Act, 1878 (No 2) “ shall be read and construed as if such 20th section had not been enacted.” We trust this measure will speedily become law. The mere fact of framing this Bill shows most conclusively that the Government are fully aware of the scandalous abuses which are perpetrated under the existing law’, and the great necessity i there exists for some check on the same. While thanking Mr Bhyce and the Government for this Bill, we feel it imperative on us to ask, in the cause of justice, that as Government has recognised, by the framing of this measure, that grave abuses do most certainly exist, that they go further and embody a retrospective clause in their Bill, whereby those scandalous and disgraceful transactions which certain companies, cliques, and persons have of late been guilty of shall be rendered null and void, especially in those instances where foolish and confiding natives have been cozened and bamboozled into making their lands over “in trust ” to scheming and unprincipled adventurers of a most daugerous type. Should any great obstacles present themselves to this measure (but we cannot see any difficulty commensurate with the immense amount of good to the cause of justice which must result from such a clause) then we must ask that an enquiry be speedily instituted into these allegations which have of late, and are still causing so much scanflal, and which, there can be little doubt, are true in the main. That the law has been hood-wiuked and its morality outraged and wronged, that all equitableness has been scouted, and justice set at nought, cannot for one moment, be doubted. Even now a notorious company is making extraordinary efforts to obtain signatures by every possible means in their power, employing for this purpose all the unscrupulous and pliable agents they can possibly secure the services of. No doubt they are spurring on in anticipation of these reforms overtaking them, and it is most assuredly the duty of Government to veto all these rascally schemes, which have been, and still are, taking place, by inserting a retrospective clause in their Bill, thus rendering it effectual in remedying these abuses not alone in the future, but also atoning to justice for the want of efficacious legislation in the past. Notwithstanding all that has been said, we must now repeat that we believe the only true and effectual remedy that can possibly be found to this evil is by Government constituting itself the sole agent, through which any native lands can be dealt with. W hen this is done —and not until this is done —will an effectual bar be created to these disgraceful Native land scandals.