THE LAND PROPOSALS.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume XLVII, Issue 81901, 13 December 1906, Page 4

THE LAND PROPOSALS.

o MH M'aAIJ INTERVIEWED. (.'hristchureh, December 7. Mr M'.Vab, .Minister of Lands, arrived this liioniinir and left liv tie first express for tl" -■:•».. th. Speaking to a Mar reporter, he said Auckland'was the hottest district th-t -onld lie approached on the question of freehold v. leasehold. Up had not jrone there to convert, only to explain. He never expected the Manakan election to go other than it had done. Mr Lang was a tried politician, while Mr Bnl lard was only a political tyro. The sympathy with the leader of the Opposition was also largely reflected in his own district. The tight ranged principally round the question of the freehold. The freehold to lease-in-perpet-uity men meant freehold at the origin al values, and they failed to realise that there was also freehold at the present values. The lease in-perpet-uity tenants were just as strong opponents of the freehold at the present values as the freeholders proper. This convinced him that the Government proposal was bound to be carried, on account of the concessions to the freeholders. Exception had been tuken to the endowment proposals, on the ground that Canterbury and Otago would be fattened at Auckland's expens*. This was simply because it was apparently not understood that the endowments in the South Island were nationalised. The revenue from the endowments was to be national. The vote would not be one for provincial districts.

Speaking at the first annual dinner of the Auckland branch of the New Zealand Farmers' Union, Mr Kichard Monk, in seconding a motion concerning the Land Bill, said, the MeXabs, the McKenzies, the Mel'addens and the McFbersons had come out to this colony because here they could obtain land of their own, and it was strange that a McXab could be found, a native of tjus country, but a son of those who came here to get a freehold, bringing down proposals of this kind. The Government landlord was no better than the private landlord, and what was wanted was the aspiration that every man should own nis own land. Some said that it was only sentiment which made a man desire the freehold. What made a nation but sentiment, and what induced colonisation but sentiment! Some of the best colonists we bad came out here at the bait of forty acres because the sentiment ol the freehold attached to that forty acres. The Government were the servants of the public, with whom the issue rested. 'The love of the freehold made men love their country, and made them spend 11 or lj hours a day out of the 24 upon the land, with a resultant weariness which led him to neglect his political necessities, with the result that he was legislated for by a man with his eight hours a day, his long beer, and his pipe.