LAND LEGISLATION.

Wairarapa Age, Volume XXX, Issue 8469, 22 June 1907, Page 5

LAND LEGISLATION.

AN EXPLANATION BY THE MINISTER. By Telegraph—Press Association. CHRISTCHURCH, June 20. Interviewed in Christchurch, today, on the subject of the order in which the land legislation will be introduced during the coming session, the Hon. R. M'Nab, Minister for Lands, made the following statement : "The Taxation Bill comes first, the Land Bill next, and then the Endowment Bill. These measures will be practically the first business to be dealt with. The Bills are all ready, and only require the perusal and approval of the Premier, who arrives from England probably on Tuesday night. s "The financial debate will not be a lengthy one. In view of the important business to come on immediately after, it is our intention, directly the Address-in-Reply is agreed to, and committees are set up, to move that the Taxation Bili be referred to the Public Accounts Committee, Sir Joseph Ward as Colonial Treasurer,'taking charge of the measure. Then the Land Bill proper will be referred to the Lands Committee. These measures will be considered and dealt with by the committees during the debate on the, Financial Statement. I will, of course, take charge of the Land Bill in the Lands Committee, so that with a moderate debate on the Financial Statement we should immediately afterwards be able to go right on with the two Bills. "All the limitation, proposals will be dealt with by means of the graduated tax, and it being a taxation Bill, the only safe provisions are those in case of refusal to pay the tax, and they, of course, are contained already in the machinery of the present Land Tax Act. In effect, it will mean an alteration of the schedule to the Act fixing the rates in the Land and Income Assessment Act. "For the first time there will be a systematic attempt made to cope with the various classes of evasion of the law—evasions that have developed during the sixteen years the law has been in force. Evasion has been reduced to a perfect science; in fact, to such an extent that persons so evading the tax are actually sending in printed forms showing the sequence of transactions, which result in the owner getting rid of his property for the taxation purposes and vesting it in another person; at the same time keeping to himself all the profit from the working of the property. We are dealing with all these methods of evading the tax. I think our proposals in this respect will receive general acceptance. From what I have seen of them, they appear to be very comprehensive, and at any rate they will increase the difficulty of evasion. I would not be surprised if the new provisions rendered many dodges for evasion of the tax absolutely impossible. Our object is to prohibit the kind of subdivision that is now going on, and secure genuine subdivision."