GRANTING OF LEASE

Gisborne Herald, Volume LXXII, Issue 21671, 24 March 1945, Page 4

GRANTING OF LEASE

HIGH SCHOOL’S POSITION ALTERED DECISION EXPLANATION OF BOARD An explanation of the difficult position in which the board had been placed in regard to the granting of a 21-year lease for an area of land owned by it at Patutahi was made by the chairman of the Gisborne High School Board of Governors, Mr. L. T. Burnard, at this week’s meeting of tiie board. Mr. Burnard read a letter from the board's solicitors which set the position out clearly. It stated that tiie' first applicant was the highest bidder at the auction, which had finished at £G Gs per acre rent, against the failrent. £3. and the Land Sales Committee had refused to confirm the transaction. Under these circumstances, said Mr. Burnard, the Public Bodies Leasing Act provided that the board could grant a lease to anyone; the procedure being that of a special resolution. That meant first a resolution of the board at one meeting, with a second confirmatory resolution at a subsequent meeting. At the November meeting the board had before it only one application, and the fact of its refusal by the Land Sales Committee. Under these circumstances the board had properly, he thought, passed a resolution granting a lease to the applicant at the fair rent.

The publication in the press of this resolution led to an application by another farmer. Tiie board was then under the duty of considering the second application before dealing with the question o{ passing a confirmatory resolution at its next meeting. The next meeting of the board was after tiie summer vacation in February, and it then heard the solicitors for both parties. Much-Debated Question After the full argument thus presented, the board debated tiie subject, and taking into account the question :ot production and of the situation of tiie respective parties, passed a resolution granting the lease to the-second applicant. That resolution came up for consideration now. Mr. Barnard read two further letters from the first applicant's solicitors elucidating points raised in discussion at the previous meeting. Mr. T. W. Sewell said that the question had been much debated at Patutahi, and it was important that there should be no misconception about what the board was doing. This view was supported by Mr. K. B. Garland. Mr. J. H. Hall said that the second applicant had a large family with very little land for their support, and he thought that the original applicant and his friends might well be prepared to realise the fairness of the board’s action at its last meeting. Mr. T. Todd said that in considering the second application the board had exercised the very function which the statute contemplated in its requirement of a special resolution, and lie felt that the decision arrived at had been the only possible one in the circuihstances.

In putting the confirmatory resolution. the chairman said that he had at first some doubt about the principle that should be adopted in the unfortunate situation created by the new statute, but lie agreed that the board had adopted an intelligible principle, and it was difficult to see what other action could be taken without widening the scope of the inquiry to a point beyond what could reasonably be undertaken by the board.

The resolution was then carried without dissent, Mr. Nolan not voting as representing one of the parties involved.