CROWN AND RATES.

Auckland Star, Volume LXVII, Issue 285, 1 December 1936, Page 10

CROWN AND RATES.

LOSS TO LOCAL BODIES. NO AMENDING LEGISLATION. (From Our Own Correspondent.) PAEROA, Monday. Placed in a parlous financial position through its inability to collect rates owing on many properties which are mortgaged to the Crown, the Hauraki United Drainage Board recently appealed to the Minister of Finance to remedy the position bv the introduction of amending legislation. Hopes that the strong arguments which the board was able to adduce might lead to the granting of some redress were dashed at last week's meeting of the ■ board, when the Prime Minister, the Rt. Hon. M. J. Savage, advised that the Crown would not accept the same liability for rates as the law imposed on private mortgagees. The board's letter asked, in effect, the Prime Minister wrote, that the Crown as mortgagee should accept the same liability for rates as was imposed 011 private mortgagees. This question had been fully considered, but the Government had* decided that it would not be justified in accepting any greater liability than existed under the present law. It appeared to be suggested, the letter concluded, that the Crown's nonliability for rates implied that the board could not recover rates. That was not so, for the board had the right to recover such rates from the original mortgagor personally, and to pursue all legal remedies against him. Moreover, if the mortgagor did not pay, it was open for the board to sell the property under the Rating Act, subject to the Crown mortgage.