MORTAGOR AND MORTGAGEE.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXVIII, Issue 20841, 7 April 1931, Page 12

MORTAGOR AND MORTGAGEE.

Sir _ln discussing the question of failure to comply with his obligations by .. a mortgagor, one should discriminate lie- : tween tha desire not to comply and the inability to comply. The first is a personal default, the second is, broadly speaking, a calamity. In 1914 we put into operation a Defence of the Realm Act, by which all sorts of restrictions •' were imposed on private rights for the benefit of the country at large. To-day our legislators say "New Zealand is a producing and exporting country first and foremost, can we afford to stand by and see our necessary and necessitous farmers walk off because they are unable to meet their mortgage liabilities?" If our legislators extend tho Defence of the Realm Act to include such cases to prevent piratical eviction or voluntary evacuation 'in a time of national stress,. surely there is 110 need to cast a stigrna on those necessitous ones who are to be saved, not merely for their own sa.kes, but for the sake of New Zealand's welfare as a whole. This is a domestic problem and affects very few outside our shores and does not come into the picture as default by nations or count lies, Fred C. S. Lawson.