LAND TRANSFER SYSTEM.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LX, Issue 18458, 23 July 1923, Page 6

LAND TRANSFER SYSTEM.

There is now before Parliament legislation aiming* to bring under the land transfer system all land titles in New Zealand.' A memorandum from the Registrar-General shows that less than 20 per cent, of existent titles will be affected, proving the degree to which landowners have already moved toward the simpler system. Its real origin is to be found in a measure passed by Parliament in 3870. An Act embodying the same principle had been placed on the Statute Book in 1860 but for various reasons, including structural defects, very little resort had been made to the advantages it offered. The measure of 1370 was introduced by Sir William Fox, then Mr. Fox, the Premier of the day. It was based on the Torrens Act, of South Australia, adopted by that colony in 1858 and subsequently copied elsewhere. A similar system, it was stated, had been in existence in Belgium and one or two other countries for many years. Young though New Zealand , was, the established systema Crown grant, with an original . and unduplicated document to show every transactionthreatened to introduce serious complications. The purpose of the land transfer, system was simplicity and security, a reduction of the record to a simple schedule, with a State guarantee of the soundness of the title. Anyone who has handled the documents and records of an old holding, often transferred, > with the original form of title still surviving, and compares them with a certificate of title under the other scheme, appreciates the simplifying effect of the law. Sir William Fox hoped, as he told Parliament, that the sale and purchase of land would become no more complicated than the. sale of a commodity over the counter. That may not be entirely so, but even discounting the claim,- it still remains true that the reform "'he \ introduced has shown its worth ia the 60 odd years it has been in existence. Proof is found in the fact that now, when its universal application is proposed, only a little over 18 per cent. of all holdings in the Dominion will bo siSseied.