DIVERTED STREAM

Sun (Auckland), Volume III, Issue 621, 25 March 1929, Page 10

DIVERTED STREAM

FARMERS SUFFER INJUSTICE MINISTER’S STRONG COMMENT (From Our Own Correspondent) THAMES, Saturday. The attitude of the Public Works Department in refusing permission to Mr. W. H. Littlejohn, of Hikutaia, to sell the spoil from the diversion of a stream through his property, was censured by the Hon. E. A. Ransom, Minister of Public Works, at Hikutaia on Friday. The Minister said it was beyond his comprehension why Mr. Littlejohn had not been granted permission to sell to the Thames County Council the spoil deposited by the Public Works when taking the stream through his property. “1 cannot see for the life of me why the request was refused,” said the Minister. Mr. Littlejohn said that he had received no compensation for the stream being diverted through his property. He had been cut oft' from five acres of his farm, and had lost acres through the cut and the clay deposited over his farm by the Public Works Department. Air. A. M. Samuel, M.P., said two other settlers had walked off their farms owing to the failure of the department to give them access to the cut-off portions of their land. One had lost £3,000 in hard cash. Air. Ransom. This refusal of compensation is not fair. It is an unjust law. I will go into it thoroughly. I think the country should stand the loss rather than the individual.