THE NEW LAND BILL.

Putaruru Press, Volume VII, Issue 305, 12 September 1929, Page 5

THE NEW LAND BILL.

PUTARURU VIEWS. Proposed Board Criticised. A representative of the Putaruru Press waited on Mr. A. R. Vosper, president of the Putaruru branch of the Farmers’ Union, and Mr. L. M. Nicklin, the secretary, to ascertain their views as to how the proposed Act coincided with a land settlement scheme initiated by the Rotorua SubProvincial Farmers’ Union Executive in Putaruru recently. Briefly the scheme made prevision for a board of three, consisting of the Commissioner of Crown Lands and two practical farmers, the board to recommend to the Minister of Lands what blocks were suitable for settlement in the centre of the North Island. This board would be advised

by a local committee consisting of two practical farmers and a manager experienced in the working of the class of country which was to be broken in. The system of roading and the general layout of the block was also to be left to the manager. The blocks were not to exceed 20,000 ■acres. Other parts of the scheme were all weather roads, preference to applicants having farming experience, the payment of settlers for their work on the basis of wages paid to farm labourers, 75 per cent to be in cash, the balance to be retained as a deposit on any land that the prospective settler took up. When asked for their opinion as to the Lands Development Board consisting of the Minister of Lands (chairman), the Under-Secretary of Lands (vice-chairman), the permanent head of the Department of Agriculture, the permanent head of the Treasury, the principal Accounting Officer in the Department of Lands -and Survey, and the Superintendent of the State Advances Office, proposed to be set up, Messrs. Vosper and Nicklin said that there was duplication of officers, instancing the case of The permanent head of the Treasury and the Principal Accounting Officer of the Land and Survey Department both being financial officers. They also favoured the cutting out of the Under-Secretary of Lands, leaving the Minister, the permanent head of the Agricultural Department and the Superintendent of State Advances. There should be two other representatives on the board, the president of the Farmers' Union and an officer of the Massey Agricultural College (Professor Riddett during his term of office) being suggested. The opinion was that there were too many civil servants on the proposed board.

Messrs. Vosper and Nicklin were ■emphatic ir. their opinion that an advisory board, consisting of practical farmers, should be set up for such locai committees would have a knowledge of the country not possessed by those in Wellington. General endorsement was given to the clauses relating to the improvements of land, but it was thought that such improvements should be -subject to supervision along the lines of a farm manager as laid down in .the local scheme. The other sections of the Act were generally approved, but where a further revaluation of lands that have already been revalued under the Discharged Soldiers’ Settlement Act, a returned soldier should have the first refusal at the lower revaluation, was the opinion of Messrs. Vosper .and Nicklin. It was Considered that -it was unnecessary to have two boards on the ground that each Island Advisory Board having to settle the land, should have the right to say what land should be purchased, and the board should be given the power to purchase such lands as they thought advisable.

In conclusion, the opinion was expressed that there was a tendency to a duplication of boards. Another farmer who was present at the interview gave it as his opinion that the success or otherwise of any land settlement scheme rested on the question of finance, and that unless adequate finance, equal at least to the Advances for Workers in town, was provided for prospective .settlers, there was not much hope of .success. There would be no complaint from the farming community if they could get 75 per cent as laid down, ’but this farmer quoted casps in which applicants for loans were as low as 30 per cent of the valuation.

Speaking of the provisions of the proposed Act in regards the settlement of undeveloped settlement lands, this farmer was of the opinion that it opened the way for speculators, and might result in another land boom —a highly undesirable thing.

well-known Tchorea farmer also

j condemned the personnel of the j Lands Development Board, holding j that it should, in addition to the MinI ister, consist of practical farmers, not departmental heads, who were totally out of touch with conditions prevailing in the country. Speaking in regards the Putaruru and Tokoroa districts, this gentleman said that these heads held views on the subject of local district lands that prevailed years ago, and they did not seem to realise that the conditions had changed since then.

SOME PRESS OPINIONS. Under the heading, “ A Land Bill With Teeth,” the Wellington Evening Post writes:— All through the long tenure of office of the Reform Governments paper provisions for the compulsory acquisition of farm lands were retained on the Statute Book, but it was the foundation principle of Reform that these provisions should be toothless. And, for that very reason,

one of the most interesting political questions before the country since the general election perhaps the most interesting political question of all has been whether the United Government would put teeth into rural land compulsory purchase. With the circulation of the new Land Bill (if it passes) that question seems to be at rest ; the teeth are there, though they are not visible on the surface because their existence has been arrived at not by putting a new mouth on the compulsory purchase dog but by knocking off the muzzle which the Reform Governments (though not the originators thereof)

had carefully maintained. What Mr. Forbes’ Land Bill says is that section 36 of the principal Act is repealed. Such enactments are generally taken as a bit of legal jargon, but this one means a lot. It means good-bye to the provision under which a compulsorily - bought - out landowner received not only the carefully-calculated unimproved value of his land but an extra 12 per cent, over and above that (comprising 2 per cent, for the purpose of “ compensation for the compulsory taking” and 10 per cent., reducible in the higher values to 5, for no purpose whatever, or at any rate for no purpose known to the Act). Gocd-bye to that addendum-to-value and good-bye also to “ the subsidiary roll,” one of the most sinister features of any valuation system, and probably pecu- . lid? to this country. The subsidiary toil was a secret roll on wliich a landowner could raise his valuations tc defeat compulsory purchase. On the law as finally revised and amended in the Land for Settlements Act, 1925—-which may be taken as being the last word of the Reform

Governments on a conservative agrarian policy which was bound to trip them up sooner or later—-section 86, with its added values and its subsidiary roll, Became a mosaic worthy of any legislative museum. It reveals the defeatist work of a lawyer pretending to be a land reformer. An impost of 12 per cent, (or, in the higher values, 7 per cent.) might have been considered to be sufficient sand in the bearings of a State compulsory pur- | chase plan which in any case was bound to find the market loaded up I against it. The Government is a I notoriously-bad buyer, as the Reform Government has proved to the tune of millions. As soon as a Government starts out to buy everyone puts up his price, and the very fact that the State buyer is in the market. causes inflation, on top of which comes the 12 per cent, or 7 per cent, impost. But that is not a sufficient obstacle to satisfy the law as it has existed to date. Over and above the general financial safeguard the landowner may dictate to the Valuer-General ’ the value of Ms land, which becomes automatically the State’s valuation, and therefore becomes the unimproved value basis of the assessment for compulsory purchase : so that a purchasing Government would have to pay whatever the landowner may declare to be the value of the land, plus addenda noted above. A glance again over this famous (or infamous) section 36 shows that the subsidiary roll shall be used “ for the purposes of the assessment of land tax.” There is no mention of rates. So apparently it is only through land tax (when such exists) that the landowner would pay for the privilege of his own overvaluation. It would be interesting if Parliament ordered a return of the subsidiary roil valuations of the last 10 years, what they meant in increased valuations, and what they meant in increased public revenue. On this subject the late Government was never communicative. If the subsidiary roll is repealed it will go off the Statute Book unwept, unhonoured and unsung.

Where a Bill expresses itself largely through the amending of past legislation, and is not visibly constructive in its own clauses, the position is complicated and the full

’ meanings are hard to define on first ' glance ; but tMs Land Bill is already ■ notable for the snags it knocks out of existing land laws, and it seems to leave the course much clearer of State purchase of land, which may cease to be a matter of parchment and may become a real weapon for subdividing subdivisible estates. While estate-breaking taxation cannot be individual in its operation, estate purchase can be ; it has, however, limitations, including the price paid (and that is where section 36 was obstructive) and the scope of Government borrowing for land purchase. No Government can borrow too many millions to buy land wMch —despite all compensation courts as fixed by the Public Works Act—automatically inflates when the rumour of the millions goes abroad. An echo of the war and post-war inflation is found in the provision put into this Land Bill by Mr. Forbes to the effect that lands that have been revalued under the Discharged Soldiers Settlement Act may be revalued (wMch of course means devalued) again.

The most arresting and at the same time the most disquieting portion of the Bill is that relating to the development by State action 1 of undeveloped Crown and settlement lands for disposition as ready-made holdings. This is something new in land settlement in New Zealand and is dictated by the Prime Minister’s obligation to redeem his election promises to provide work for the unemployed and to bring into settlement and production unoccupied Crown lands. A Lands Development Board is to be appointed to make recommendations to the Minister regarding the selection of Crown lands and the nature of the development to bp undertaken ; and the Minister is empowered to raise loans up to five millions sterling to cover the cost of this and other objects of the Bill. TMs sum is in addition to the annual appropriation of £750,000 to acquire lands for .settlement. The progress of this new settlement scheme, if it stands the change from words to action at all, will he watched with interest. State control of speculative enteiprises suffers from many defects, and it is impossible to dismiss' the fear that this attempt to solve two complex economic problems at once may end in costly failure. Economy in the development of Crown and settlement lands by State action is a hollow hope. By the time that process is completed the land will be so loaded with capital liability and interest charges as to make it unprofitable to hold, and the next step, will be a revaluation, a writing down, and another burden for the taxpayer to bear. I* is extraordinary that ingenuity should be strained to produce these far-fetched schemes to settle people on the land when the practical solution stares politicians in the face. It is simply to do everything possible to reduce farming costs, so that it will pay men to get on to the land. Instead we find the Government deliberately loading farmers with bur'dens on Monday and on Tuesday devising expensive schemes to induce others to shouldfe- them. ChristChurch Press.