NATIVE LAND SURVEYS.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XLV, Issue 13875, 8 October 1908, Page 8

NATIVE LAND SURVEYS.

Sir,-In your leading article . to-day '.you' refer to the shameful treatment of surveyors who have in the past surveyed native lands!. I will give you my experience in this connection. In the year 1893 t ho" surveyor made the survey of a block of some 600 acres at a cost of £32. He was awarded a Native Land Court order for this amount on July 7, 1894. Finding that, the natives would not pay, although they could easily have done so, the surveyor registered his order as a survey lien against the land on June 26, 1897. The land being in that huge district known as native land under the Thermal Springs Act, but miles away from any hot water, it was found the surveyor could not sell the land nor could be cut out enough area to satisfy his lien. Finding he could not get paid for his work he asked Government to take transfer' of the lien, the same as they had done in many cases in the same district where timber grew. The Government, however, knowing there was no milling timber on the block, refused to take a transfer ot lien. The surveyor thought that his lien bore interest at .5 per cent., and that ultimately when the natives sold the land to the Government (no one else could buy it) his lien with interest would be paid to him. The surveyor in the meantime became poor; and finding he could not afford to carry the lien indefinitely he sold out his interest to mo. . In the year 1900 I- approached l Air. Seddon, the then Premier, to see whether ho would get the Native . Land Purchase Department to take over the lien, but I was not of the right- colour and. I did not succeed. But Mr. Seddon went further; he told me that he would pass a law stopping interest on my lien. I told him that would be unjust, seeing that the lien was practically .a mortgage and was registered as such under t!io Land Transfer Act; that if he could do what lie threatened he might do the samo to any registered land transfer mortgage. Mr. Seddon. told me ho could pass such - a law, and sure enough he slipped in a clause, section 46 of the Native Lands Claims Adjustment and Laws Amendment Act.. 1901. This clause was specially directed against this one lieu of £32 at 5 per cent., and the effect of tin*. clause • was that '* no more than five year.;' interest at the rate of 5 per cent, shall lie recoverable in respect of any survey* lien." .In the meantime the block of land which was surveyed in 1893 ■ has become valuable, andis! worth now £4000. . The natives have become land rich, and the poor surveyor went through the - Bankruptcy Court. • , On March 26 lust these cruel facts were lav*, before Sir Robert Stout, and lie promised' that he would "ask the Native Department- to discharge the lien." I waited four months, and nothing came of this.promise. In the month of July last I wrote Sir Robert inquiring what he had done in the matter. I have now waited almost three months, and ho has not replied to my letter. I enclose* my card* > > Hqpeebbs,