CORRESPONDENCE.

Hawera & Normanby Star, Volume XVII, Issue 2952, 15 October 1891, Page 2

CORRESPONDENCE.

POLITICAL.

To the Editor of the Star.

Sir, — Mr. Ballance is reported to have said that " the great bulk of the people of the colony who held freehold land held their land under mortgage, and it would be better for them to hold the land under a rent from the Crown than under a rent payable in the shape of interest to mortgagees, who had no bowels of compassion." Is this so ? Let us suppose uwo sections placed side by side ; one is freehold and the other what Mr. Ballance wants, perpetual lease without right of purchase. The freehold has been sold for £2 per acre; the leasehold has been rented lor 2s annual rent per acre. The area of eaoh is 100 acres. Both parties have money enough for improving and stocking to a certain extent, viz., £200 each (no man should go ou land absolutely penniless). One buys, and borrows money to improve. This he can do if he engages to spend a fair amount on permanent improvements. He pays, say, 8 per cent., though perhaps he may get the money for 7 per cent. ; the other pays 5 per cent, in rent. There is, therefore, a difference of 2s or 3s per acre acre rent in favor of the leaseholder. We will suppose that both are industrious, careful men, and prosper accordingly. Years elapse : the freeholder has long since paid off his mortgage, and sits rent free. If he wishes to sell at any time, either before or after the mortgage is paid off, he has no one to consult but himself, while the leaseholder is still paying his 5 per oent., and, as regards sale, is at the meroy of a Land Board, he is not a free agent. But now comes the critical test of the system. The lease is nearly out, the land bas to be ra-valned, minus improvements, and the lessee will get the option of renting it at the increased rent, or of letting it go out of his hands. It is quite plain that land of first-olaBS quality (and for the matter of that of seoond-class either) must increase in value, for the amount of it obtainable is admittedly very limited. Moreover, the world is now our market. Distance, through the agency of steam, with electricity in the background, but rapidly coming to the front as a cheaper and better motor, is all but annihilated. Climate in transit ceases to be a bar, through the operation of the freezing machine, and, as a necessary consequence to the facilities of travel, we are getting better known and our land better appreciated. All this points to an enormous increase in the " unearned increment" when present leases expire, an increase which the freeholder puts in bis pocket or that of his cbildren, but which the leaseholder give's to the State. Bat, in addition to losing the " unearned increment," the leaseholder, or his children, bas to pay , a very much increased rent or give-up the land while the freeholder is hiß_ own master, and " monarch of all he surveys." There is no question but that perpetual without right to purchase is best for the State, but I, think, worse for the individual by a very long way. It is, of course, one of the planks of that gigantio humbug, the so-called " Liberal Party," for that party is mainly composed -of townspeople and shiftless loafers. The loafers are, of course, ready for any change, and the towns* people, with that blindness whioh seems inherent in humanity when self is concerned, would kill the goose which lays the golden eggs, or, in other words, oppress the country settler through whom he gets his living. It is cheap generosity which is generous with other people's money though, of course, it is natural for the town to shift taxation from its own shoulders on to those of the country. Land nationalisation was tried in Pern under the Inoas, and with what result ? That the nation was little removed from serfdom, True, there was no poverty, but there was no incentive to exertion, and a total lack of that energy, pluck, and independence of oharaoter which has made the Anglo-Saxon both the envy and boast of the world. In conclusion I think that Mr, Bryce never said a truer word than that the time was soon coming when the country would have, in self-defence, to marshal is forces against those of the town. —I am, <feo., J. W. Kenah. EUham, October lath, 1891.