Crown lease land doubt

Press, 24 September 1983, Page 2

Crown lease land doubt

Parliamentary reporter

Sir Basil Arthur (Labour, Timaru) yesterday asked the Minister of Lands, Mr Elworthy, for assurances about the freeholding of Crown pastoral lease land.

He asked Mr Elworthy for an assurance that no pastoral lease land would be offered for freeholding at any other than existing market values. He also asked for an assurance that no such land would be offered for freeholding until all conserva-

tion and recreational matters involving it were resolved.

On behalf of Mr Elworthy, the Minister of Social Welfare, Mr Young, gave no assurances, but outlined the procedure for the freeholding of pastoral land. Mr Young said that no land held on Crown pastoral lease could be freeholded until it had been reclassified as farmland by the Land Settlement Board.

In considering land for reclassification, the board had regard to whether areas of recreational potential or

environmental significance should be retained or protected in the public interest.

“Reclassification decisions can, therefore, contain conditions relating to those issues,” he said.

Once land was reclassified, applications for freeholding were processed in line with provisions of the Land Act, 1948. “That legislation provides for the freeholding price to be determined, based on the valuation of the land, exclusive of improvements, and less an allowance for the lessee’s goodwill,” he said.