Te Aroha AND Ohinemuri News AND UPPER THAMES ADVOCATE. WEDNESDAY. JULY 17,1895.

Te Aroha News, Volume XII, Issue 1751, 17 July 1895, Page 2

Te Aroha AND Ohinemuri News AND UPPER THAMES ADVOCATE.

WEDNESDAY. JULY 17,1895.

• TETMb above ffll—to thluo owe aolf !*»&ra®, And ft neat follow ea tbs night the any Tbo« canot cob then be false to an; man. 1 BHASBSPBABS.

Two bills of similiar character have been introduced into the House of Eepresentatives by Mr John Me Kenzie and Sir Robert Stout. One is entitled The Family Homes Protec tion Bill and the other The Homes Security Bill. Not only are they measures of similar character, but with one important exception the wording is almost the same, showing that both must have been copied from One model, probably American. The object in each case is to establish a sort of entail by which land shall be’ absolutely protected from seizure by creditors. Mr McKenzie’s proposal is comparatively modest as he stops at £IOOO in value, but Sir Robert Stout goes so far as £SOOO. The bills propose that before laud can be so set aside as a family home it must be ascertained that if; is-unencumbered and that the owner is able to pay all his debts in full, and full notice is to be given so that any creditor can lodge'objections. After that the proprietor is to be, allowed to do what he likes io v the way of running up hills, and still hold his property in spite of everyone. There are many cases in which one. or two persons,, or families must suffer, and one of the greatest. difficulties of courts of justice is to determine in which way the lees unmerited loss is to be inflicted. If a man with proportySwoith £SOOO or even £IOOO is-to be allowed to evade the. payment of his debts surely the loss, does- not fall where it should do. The creditor may be a man with hardly any money at all and under dire distress himself. It Sir Bober t Stout’s Bill were to become law one might;see the owner of a thousand acres of land—almost a social pest in fact—in a position to dqfy bis creditors and go, defraud people much worse off than Even if a man has only e, thousand pounds worth of property it is hard to eee why he should he exempted from the obligation of honesty to his fellow men; ft may be said' that the notification of the fact that a certain property was about to be declared, a famuy home would be so'public that all the world would be warned not to give the owner credit, but in reality the world vvould hot take the warning and the oredit would be given as mum as ever, j There is. a story of a man who was said to have fritted away his fortune in paying his debts, and Mr McKenzie and Sir Robert Stout are evidently anxious that certain landowners should bo saved from such ex-, travagance.' - ■•' ■- 1 ,1 ■ - , ■■