TREATY OF WAITANGI

Rotorua Morning Post, Volume 2, Issue 399, 7 December 1932, Page 5

TREATY OF WAITANGI

("Post" Special Commissioner) ,

BOARD TO ADMINISTER LORD BLEDISLOE'S GIFT SET UP NATION'^ HISTORIC SPOT

Wellington, Tuesday. The incorp'oration of the board which has been appointed to administer the area of land on which th'e Treaty of Waitangi was signed and which was recently presented to the Dominion hy the Governor-General, Lord Bledisloe and Lady Bledisloe, is provided for in the Waitangi National Trust Board Bill which was introduced into the House of Representatives to-day and read a first time. Members of the board are their Excellencies, the Prime Minister (Rt. Hon. G. W. Forbes), the Minister of Lands (Hon. E. A. Ransom), the Minister of Native Affairs (Hon. Sir A rnTtirm Nfatal. Mr. K. S. W^illiams,

M.P., Mr. Tau Henare, M.P., Mr. V. H. Reed, Hon. Sir Heaton Rhodes, Hon. Sir Franeis Bell and the Minister of Puhlic Works (Rt. Hon. J.) G. Coates). The powers of the board as set out in the declaration of the trust (the terms of which have already heen puhlished), are given full legislativ© effect. It is set out that every person is liable, on summary conviction, to imprisonment for three months or to a fine of £50 who, unless authorised hy the board, lights any fires on the lands vested in the board; wilfully breaks or injures fences or buildings erected on the land, wilfully injures or removes any foliage or property on the lands, wilfully digs, cuts or injures the turf, shoots at any bird or animal, or wilfully takes, destroys or injures any hird or animal or nest or egg of any hird. The board is empowered to make hy-laws for the good management of the lands vested in it, including the rights of the general puhlic to aecess to the area. Such regulations are to he app'roved by the Governor-General . hefore hecoming effective. The land is to he exempt from the payment of taxes and rates.