LAND POLICIES

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume LXI, 8 August 1928, Page 6

LAND POLICIES

LABOUR AND REFORM

/THE “USEHQLD” ISSUE ' (By Telegraph) (From.-“ The Mail’s ' Parliamentary Reporter). WELLINGTON, 7th August. A clause in lliu Hanmor Crown Leases Bill prohibiting the transfer of leases without the consent of the Canterbury Land Board precipitated a controversy over tho “usehold” issue in the House of Representatives to-day. The Minister of Lands (the Hon. A. ( ID. McLeod) said that there was not a Crown lease issued but,which contained conditions of that sort and under which tho conditions had to he fulfilled before a transfer was granted. That had been the law in this country for thirty or forty years past. In no Crown lease was there a clause stating that a man should be debarred from gating what his interest was in tho lease. The Labour Party had urged that there should be some bar on the price to be paid for tho lease, and the Government said that so long as tho tenant had performed all the conditions he had a perfect right to transfer to whom, he liked' within those conditions. The Government did not interfere between buyer and seller as to what the interest in the leAse should ho. Leasehold could be mortgaged in the same way as freehold. He challenged the Labour Party to say whether it disapproved of that policy. The Leader of the Opposition (Mr IT. E. Holland) considered that under the Bill a lessee had no power in his own right to deal with the equity in his lease. The Minister of Lands and his ;part,y had attacked the Labour Party at the last election for advocating a similar principle. , Not only /that, ibut the Reform Party i repudiated responsibility for the legislation and a responsible Minister of the Crown (the Hon. Sir James’ Parr"), who might have been expected to speak for the Reform Party, practically told his hearers that the Reform Party would repeal the legislation containing the principle. He wanted to know why the Government repudiated the. attitude which they took up last election. Why were they writing into legislation this very princinla which they denounced in 1925? “It is not a question of whether that principle is correct or not. What is involved is the attitude of the Government party in 1925 and its attitude at the present lime.”

Mr McLeod asked Mr Holland if he thought a man should have the right to mortgage a lease. Mr .Holland: “That is not the point. The point is that this principle was denouncecl by tho Minister and . his colleagues last election and i>ow they are enacting it into legislation. If the principle is right, then they (the Reform Party) were hopelessly Wrong last election. Why did they mislead the electors last time?” , * 'Plie Minister of Education (the Hon. R, A. Wright) said the Labour members knew quite well that the Labour Party s land policy in 1925 was totally different from what was now proposed. Tjhe crux of the principle of that policy was that a man owning the freehold could only sell to the Crown and that at a stipulated price. He could not sell in the open market and get a market price. That was the principle which the Reform Party had attacked. “I don’t think the hon. gentleman could convince anyone outside his own party, if lie could even convince them,” said the Minister, “that the principle is the same in both cases.” . _ , r,' , Mr McLeod said the Labour 1 ally undoubtedly found themselves m a difficulty. They had put their foot in it and were now trying to flounder out oft to the bank.