SMALL GRAZING RUNS

Wairarapa Age, Volume XXXII, Issue 10685, 3 August 1912, Page 5

SMALL GRAZING RUNS

MR d. McGregor in reply. Mr D. McGregor writes as follows to the Wairarapa Age:— "I should like, with your permission, 1 to reply to some statements made by I Mr Judd,, regarding an interview with the Premier, on the above subject. In justice to myself, I ought to state my reason for being there at all. As trustee in the Dagg's estate, I felt it to bo my duty to see, as far as I could, that justice should be done to the tenants, because what applies to the one applies to the others. Mr Judd accuses me of making misstatements. The first is, that I did slander a fertile district by. stating that much of it had no roads, only a 'surveyor's track.' * Perha.ps the report was not very clear on the point, but I think most people would catch what I meant, viz., the state of the district when 1 visited it, before it was improved by the tenants. I defy anyone to prove that I ever said one word to disparage the district. I have always held a very high opinion of it, especially that part of it that Mr Judd had the good fortune to acquire. Why he, above all men, should object to bis fellow settlers enjoying the s:ime privilege, I cannot for the life of me understand. How would Mr Judd like the Government to stop in now and ' take possession of his land, which is eminently suitable for subdivision, by j paying the price of his improvements, plus the original cost? I think he would rear a bit, and rightly, too. And yet those tenants have done all the pioneer work that he has done, only under less favourable conditions. Then the proposed new road is, as I have stated, utterly unsuitable for settlement, and every winter it is in a state of flood. So say those avlio know the valley bettor than either Mr Judd or myself. Once more, there is no gravel. True, there is a cement pit, but it is so inaccessible and hard to dig out, that the cost is practically prohibitive. Then, with regard to dairying. If anyone visited that district during the milking season that happened to be a damp one, 1 would not have to say one .word to convince him that it was not suitable for that purpose. I have seen two strong horses struggling through the mud, with a few cans o-f milk, and-1 believe I the remains of a milk cart can be seen to this day stuck in the mud. Mr Judd was fortunate again in this respect, because his farm was next door to t he cause his farm was next door to the town to which these settlers come, and is" as I stated, 20 miles away. There is no town'at Mangamahoe, and Eketahuna is not the natural outlet .But the strongest point in the tenants' case is this, that when they took up their leases they believed that they had the right of renewal for another twenty-one years at a rental of 2| per cent, on the unimproved value. These tenants interpreted the Act of 1885 under which their leases were taken up, to mean that, or they would never have undertaken the difficulties they had to face. Mr Massey, after look- 1 ing into the question very carefully, thinks the tenants were quite justified in expecting a renewal. Unfortunately, Acts of Parliament are not i alwavs what they seem to be, and he has decided to submit the question to the Crown Law Officers, and if their report confirms bis opinion, then he intends to see that the tenants shall have justice done to them. I cannot understand how any fair-minded person can object to this course. I hope, Sir, that the outcome of this will be a renewal of the leases, and that those leaseholders, in conjunction with all the others in the Colony, will get also the option of the freehold."