Evening Post. WEDNESDAY, OCTOBER 13, 1920. MORE THAN FREEHOLD

Evening Post, Volume C, Issue 90, 13 October 1920, Page 5

Evening Post. WEDNESDAY, OCTOBER 13, 1920. MORE THAN FREEHOLD

The Rotorua Township Bill, which was introduced in the House of Representatives last week, should receive the attention of all who desire the State to retain that which should be surrendered to no private interests. The Bill proposes to grant the fee simple of township lands in Rotorua; but it involves an issue greater than leasehold v. freehold. This i.s no example of the backblocks settler, toiling for years in virgin countrY and failing to receive in those years the full reward of his labour. The leaseholders of Rotorua neither created nor improved the natural wonders of the thermal district. They hay« built no baths, nor provided any access. They have not developed the place,. For years it seems they have been " insistently demanding " tho freehold; but an insistent demand establishes no right or title to lands which should remain the property of the people as a whole. The Bill has only commenced its passage through the House, and arguments may yet be advanced which will excuse the Government's introduction of the measure, but wo cannot^believe.that any reasons will be forthcoming which will warrant acceptance of the proposals. Accepting the first reading debate as indicating the main arguments for the Bill, we find that Rotorua townsfolk are to have the freehold: (1) because they pay no rates; (2) because their ground rents are insufficient to provide for the construction of good roads; (3) because their present tenures are not sufficiently secure; **(4) because they have insistently demanded the freehold; (6) because they will be content with the freehold of. the town (which means revenue), and do not ask for the freehold of the baths and reserves (which require expenditure).

Taking these reasons as a whole, they support one of two cases: either the leaseholders have been fortunate in paying less than their due, or the Government has been grossly careless in spending what the leaseholders paid. Their rentals have not been appropriated to uses beyond their own borders, and much State money has flowed into the thermal district. If the Government has 'mismanaged the town, and if the townspeople have had no say in directing their 'own affairs, these complaints could surely be remedied without a surrender of all State rights. Nature has supplied free the wonders which give Rotorua its value, arid the Government has been the chief developing agent. The springs, geysers, and reserves are to remain State property, but if the surrounding land is to pass wholly and absolutely into prfvate hands, will not those springs and reserves be exploited, less directly, but as thoroughly, as if they aleo werri privately owned? More thoroughly, ,we think, /or the maintenance of the baths and ofcher resorts will bfe the State's liability, and the freeholders will benefit by any new Government development which attracts more visitors. Even now the Government contemplates the expenditure of some thousands of pounds on improvements at the baths, and Sir William Herries ingenuously stated that the townspeople did not want the baths^because they would involve too much expenditure. The one or two speakers who supported the Bill on its introduction made a parade of the condition that the fee simple was not to be given at its original value, .but that the leaseholders would pay to the State the "community created" value or f unearned increment." This irt itself is an admission o£ weakness. If the lessees are not entitled lo the unearned increment which has accrued from the time of their occupation to the present, how do they gain the title to the " community created" values of the future? The community which creates the value in Rotorua is not the small section that occupies the land (and fails to make jiood ueads), but the whole community of New Zealand, and all those people who visit the wonders with which 'Nature (and not the leaseholders) has so ndiJ.y Midowsd the district. Strip Rotovua, af its wonda» *nd th« worke

done by the State., and what value would the local community have created? Not sufficient to petition Parliament for, we warrant. The community which has added ta the value, and will add to it still more, should retain it. This, we repeat, is more than a question of leasehold v. freehold. A Government which uses its majority and a freehold mandate to barter portion of an exceptional heritage misuses the powor and misinterprets the mandate. The people whose .rights are threatened should make this plain.