Untitled

New Zealand Herald, Volume XXIII, Issue 7689, 14 July 1886, Page 4

There seems some difficulty in coming to a conclusion as to what has caused the Ma,oris on the West Coast to commence holding frequent meetings, and to build houses on land occupied by Europeans. Maoris are not in the habit of formulating their grievances like Europeans, but sometimes refrain from giving expression to their inmost thoughts. When one native has a grievance, the whole of his countrymen around him make common cause, and generally there is a prophet at hand to favour them with a few revelations, and to add the element of fanaticism to anything else there may be. It seems that on the West Coast the grievance is the familiar ono of the nonpayment of rent. A large portion of land is there leased under the system which the present Government desire to make as far as possible universal, that is, the European tenant pays to a Government officer, who passes the money through certain Governmental processes, and pays it over to the natives, after deducting charges, commissions, and other etceteras. In ithese hard times it is difficult occasionally for the tenants to have their rents ready for rent-day, and it ii said also that after it ia paid into the hands of the Government officer, great delay ocoura in having it paid over to the landowners, and when that does take place, that it is found to have been too severely ''sweated." We have no doubt that great delay takes place at all events, and we have no doubt also that the costs of this kind of land -agency business, as carried on by the Government, are enormously heavy. The system will be ruinously unprofitable for the Government if, whenever there is any complaint about non-payment of rents, the colony is put in a state of alarm, and bodies of policemen are marched about, threatening the natives on one day and dining with them hilariously on another. The delay in the payment of rents, and the heavy charges made, are the only grievances we have heard of, and in all probability they are real, and are the causes of the prefient agitation on the West Coast. Thin is a danger which must always exist under a system of Maori landlordism and Government agency. Native lands ought never to be dealt with under such a system. Ample reserves should be laid oft' for the Maoris, and they should be encouraged in every way to cultivate them, and to settle down to habits of industry. The remainder of their land should be sold, either to Europeans, or to the Government for purposes of settlement. But to establish the Maoris as landowners, who are to have the Government as bailiffs, is about the worst possible system of landholding. The consequence ■ on the West Coast appears to be that, when one or two tenants are behindhand with the cash, or the Government are slow in making the payments, a whole district is kept in a state of alarm, and settlers who have paid up to to the last fathing, or who are living on their own freeholds, are subjected to great annoyance and loss.