NATIVE LAND SALES BILL.

Hawera & Normanby Star, Volume I, Issue 21, 23 June 1880, Page 4

NATIVE LAND SALES BILL.

The following 'summary of the Native Land Sales Bill, introduced by the Hon. Mr. Bryce, is given in the Wanganui Herald: — This Bill provides that when the owners of any block of land desire to sell or lease it, they shall make application in writing to the Land Board, stating their desire, and when the Board is satisfied that all the owners concur in the application, it may order the sale of the land. If any of the owners be an infant, the Board may appoint a trustee to act on his behalf, " with such power of dealing with his interest as the Board may think iit." The proceeds of the sale are to be

handed to the Eeceiver of Land Revenue, who must immediately pay them to the Public Trustee, who must keep a separate account, to be duly audited, for each estate. After paying the cost 6of survey and advertising, the fees of the Land Court and other costs ordered by it, together with the duties payable to Government, a commission of one per cent, to the Receiver of Land Revenue, and a sum of not less than 10 or more than 30 per cent, for roadmaking, the Public Trustee is to hand over the balance of the purchase money to the native owners. No lease, Crown grant, or other certificate ot title to any native land is valid, unless it has been previously explained to the native owner by a licensed interpreter, who must endorse upon the deed a Maori translation of it. A married woman of the Maori race is treated, for the purposes of this Bill, as a femme sole, and all future transfers or conveyances of land must be made under this Bill. The Governor is empowered to tak , for road or railway purposes, 5 per cent, of any land granted to natives, unless the grant be endorsed by him with an exemption from the operation of this provision, or fifteen years have elapsed from the date of the grant. But land occupied by pahs, native villages, or cultivations, buildings, gardens, orchards, plantations, burial or ornamental grounds, cannot be taken without compensation. This clause is retrospective in its action — that is, the Governor has this power over lands already granted. In the case of an uncompleted contract of sale of land from the natives to the Government, the Land Court is empowered by this Bill to order the completion of the contract on any terms it may think fit, or to order the restitution of any money paid upon it to the natives, or to declare that the land or any part of it has been ceded to Her Majesty.