The Waikato Times.

Waikato Times, Volume X, Issue 769, 19 May 1877, Page 2

The Waikato Times.

Equal and exact justice to all men, Of whatever state or persuasion, religious or •- political ■ ' ' ; ' „ : - ■ ■..•■," . /• .-,'.,• .'„■ ..,•... .. # : Here 1 shall the Preso the People's' right niamtaifi, t * ' •' UuawedJJy iafluence and uubribed bv eain

i SM^UIADAX't -M4 F J9H877.

The following; paragraph appears in/ the Thursday's issue of our morning cbnte'mjjoraryi the' /New Zealand Herald*:*—." We understand -that .'"the Waste Lands Board expect to * have handed over^ to -them'foF adj /'ministration , within a, few weeks " the whole of the' confiscated lands. "Portions of these lands, and of u blocks in thenorth .will, be brought " into the .market- as soon as pos'"sible,- so as' tb exhaust the Vplun"teer " scrip' 3 flow ' outstanding, .j* amounting /t0,7J813,000/" "« .There, ds a semi-official ring about the above wtiibh : v& .journalist cannot mistake; r and,< if (we are not much deceived, the paragraph has been furnished^to our. contemporary less /With .the tintentipn ,pf proyid(ng him with a morceau of interesting news than of comprpmising him,, by its . \n „ the', the' .'defence, of a Vourse' by the ' .Auckland Waste Land Board which we- fJUljje ; deliounced, 'and shall n^l^tate to denounce, a^)^ most' : iJhfair' to; the settlers on theslß and other' confiscated lands, and as throwing the Board itself, dh. this! matter, open to I very grave censure as 1 unfit to deal with_the duties entrusted to them. Upon the settlers of Waikato chiefly will this injustice be perpetrate^. Here, after, .years of labour and' capital expended, the .settlors have raised the general value of the lands adjacent to' their farms to a much higher value than the nominal upset price, and- the whole of this £13,000 worth of scrip, not forty of which have been' issued to residents in the district, will, as a consequence, be exercised in the Waikato. What chance will a settler, desirous of extending his homestead, have in the next local land sales, when he is brought into competition with one or two "big" men who have bought up these thirty-acre scrip for £4: and £5 a-piece, and who will pay them in, as representing £30 each against the settlers, hard cash 1 This is playing into the hands of monopoly with a v vengeance, and makes more pointed the question which has been already asked, Whether the "big" men on the Waste Lands Board were aware or not that another " big n man was the chief holder of these scrip I