THE NATIVE LAND PROPOSALS.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XXII, Issue 7382, 17 July 1885, Page 6

THE NATIVE LAND PROPOSALS.

[B? TBLEGRAPU.— I>RKSS ASSOCIATION.] Christchurcm, Thursday. The Times has au article on the new Native Land Bill, chiefly at the expense of what it calls "the Auckland land sharks." It asserts that South Islanders in general know little or nothing about the matter, and that the newspaper agitation against the Bill is directed by unseen, powerful, and interested persons. The article concludes :—" Wβ are told that committees when elected will never sell, aod they will wrangle for years about reserves and other matters, and will finally at the most lease the reserved part of their blook. The European purchasers disgusted at the difficulties and obstacles in their path, will give up trying to get native land through the Court at all, and the settlement of the North Island will thus be stopped. A dreadful proapect truly, gloomy enough to have been evolved from the visionary brain of Mr. " Frightful Dream " Rolleston. We fancy we see the persevering Auckland land shark retired from hasineas, hie occupation gone, and all because he was to deal with seven men instead of seventy or seven hundred men, women, and children. We should have thought that if it has been possible to wheedle, bamboozle, and defraud whole tribes or hapus, it might not be impossible to do business with a small committee. The truth is, that the mere work of negotiation will be much simplified, bHt as an intelligent committee will be moro diffiuult to swindle than the majority of a tribe, the laud shark is naturally horrified at the prospect;. If even a committee's deliberations are prolonged, they will be trifling compared with the endless negotiations for title which have marked such purchases as that of the Murimotu block. One might think the attacks on the score of delay levelled at Mr. Ballanoe's scheme that native land purchase in the past had been aught than dilatory, perplexing, infinitely troublesome, and frightfully costly. Shonld it oomo to pass that the committee syatsm tells in favour of ample reserves being retained from blocks when disposed of, that will be a good thing ; it ifc results in portions of tribal lands being leased instead of sold, that will be a good thing also. To talk of such tendencies being to checkmate settlement in the North Island is an exaggeration that borders on the ludicrous. What persons expeot to gain by such exhibitions of sound and fury we do not know. If Mr. Ballance's Bill is half as bad as the critics have deolared logioal dissection would soon seal its fate with the aid of wild and frantic alarms."