EVENING SITTING.

Hawke's Bay Herald, Volume XXII, Issue 7913, 30 November 1887, Page 2

EVENING SITTING.

The House resumed at 7.30. DUNEDIN MAYORAL ELECTION. . . The Public Proclamations Validation Bill, to enable the date of the Mayor»l ' >' election at Dupedin to be altered, was ' - passed through its remaining stages. THE LAND BILL. ' -.' Mr M'Kenzie continued the debate on . v .; the Land Bill. He criticised each clause, '• ' ■ " ■ "f -" . ■"*-:

" ■■~i\{” md raised 1 v&non^ objections to some of the existing Act. .•-"\iv"'"He averred* that:' the measure v favored -jrjs-' iunnnyism,' and urged the -Minister to r<v keep the. Land-Boards, and make them " -'."/' Selective.-' -- - ' i '-'■-■ Mr Valentine "was satisfied with the K bill as a. whole. He considered the ;■■: measure reflected great credit on the Minister for Lands. He thought it a pity, however, that that gentleman had not gone a step further and abolished the commissioners -of school land endowments. The land legislation of the late Government had done much barm, and it -I was high time a remedy was applied. ■ Village settlements would never be a success while they were plaated so far . ■ from 'commercial centres. -He hoped to see the hill amended in the direction of disposing of lana\ by ballot instead of auction. Mr Buchanan also congratulated Mr Richardson on his work, and prophesied that it would nieet with general acceptance throughout the colony. In answer to Mr M'Konzie's remarks Mr Buchanan j said that all the liberal provisions of the i existing Act would be still available ) under the bill before the House. He j knew for a fact that many settlers had j been driven from the country because I they could only get land on deferred payj raent or perpetual lease. Now it was pro- | posed to allow them to select their own : tenure. He had not quite made up his mind j as to the wisdom of abolishing the Land j Boards, for he was afraid it would throw ;. too" much power into the hands of the Minister of the day. ■■ Mr Duncan held that county councils' l' should be given power to classify the land, , ; and, in fact, to 'do a great deal of the - work now done by the Land Boards, th« • abolition of whiehlie agreed with. : Mr Cowan gave general approval to the , bill, ' and commended . the desire of the ' Minister to relieve the settlers. But he : would not like to see the Land Boards j disappear. As to the endowments, bis own opinion was that they had net been 1 judiciously managed, and he therefore agreed with the proposed change. Mr Seymour' intended to support the 1 second reading because what was good in f*-^tae bill predominated over the bad. He j hoped to see the clauses relative- to the i abolition of the Land Boards excised in ] conimittee, and suggested that the Gorj ernment might stop making any payment j to the members, They would get just as / good men; ( Mr Beetham thought the Waste Lands V Committee, would find it necessary to j make some amendments in the bill, but on the whole it was a business- like production. He thought the proposal to open, lands, to sale "before survey* wise ! one, for his experience was that many j desirable settlers had to be refused land 1 because the survey staff could not overtake their work. The minimum price ot land in the Wellington district had been fixed too high. He disagreed with the limitation ot the pu.rchasea.ble area- of first-class land to 640 acres, and also thought that the lands should he divided into three classes instead of two. It wonld be most nnwise to abolish the Land Board systsm altogether, but it ought to be made partly elective. Mr Steward considered the* bill a distinct improvement on' the present Act, with the exception of the clauses relating to the Land Boards. Sir Julius' Vogel thought the bill meant neither more nor less than a forced sale of Crown lands, and would tend to increase rather than diminish the size of holdings. , - The result would be war between the ; landed and the landless classes, and in . ■ the end a very severe graduated land tax would have to be imposed. Dummyism wonld be concealed only by the thinest veil. . As a man could make a purchase in ~ each survey district he would be able to - secure as' much as 100,000 acres in all. They' had for some years been going in the direction of conserving the land for purposes ' ef settlement and population, and it seemed to him that they were now about to undo all the good that had been done by the last two Governments. Under . clause 3 a largo quantity of pastoral land in Canterbury, the leases of which would shortly fall in, could be bought for ten shillings an acre, though this land eight years a»o had oeen K witbdrawn from sale on the ground. that it was worth more x than the statutory price of two pounds per acre. The abolition of the Waste Lands Boards was a niece of centralisation which wonld not be acceptable to the colony. In other respects the bill was objectionable as favoring speculation, and he hoped "to see it very materially altered by the Waste Lands Committee. • .Mr Fisher denied , that there was any intention to force sales. The Government only . desired to see the land pay for the administration of the law relating;' to it. During Sir Julius Vogel's term of office the result of the administration had been a deficiency, and they were trying to remedy this. Mr Fisher quoted Sir Julius Vogel's Ashburton speech' to show that he (Sir Julius) had changed bis views about the land legislation of the past few years/ "Since leaving the Government benches the whole of Sir Julius Vogel's remarks -had been actuated by hostility to the Government. Mr Seddon in the course of a lengthy speech opposed the bill, and moy,ed that it be read a second time that- day six months. Mr Taylor said that with the exception of fixing the price all that was sought by the bill could be effected under the present Aat. - \ Mr Guinness moved the adjournment of the debate. ' The' Government opposed the adjournment, which was tegatived by 38 to 6. [Left sitting at 2 a.m.]