LAND BOARD

New Zealand Times, Volume LIV, Issue 9841, 23 February 1893, Page 2

LAND BOARD

DEFERRED PAYMENT THIRDS. The Land Board held a special meeting yesterday to consider proposals for expending accrue! thirds and fourths from local bodies. Present The Comtnijsioßor (in the chair), Messrs A, W. Hogg, F, Piranl and W. A. Filzherberfc. The Commissioner having referred to an article which had recently appeared in the Evening Post with reference to the delay which had taken place in handing over the money to the Pahiatua County Council, read the following statement :—E beg to place on record my most emphatic denial that the Lands Department bad In any way delayed the payments of thirds due to the Pahiatua County Council, or that the amounts due have not been paid over owing to the settlers sot replying to the circular addressed to them, asking which roads their land opened ep, or that repeated promises of payment had been made to the PahUtaa County Council, which have not been fulfilled. The facta, asstated'Yn the-Evening Post of the 10th of February last, are as follows • On the 10th of November last I forwarded complete schedules and plans showing the roads to the County Council, asking them to show the roads on which it was proposed lo expend the accrued thirds payable to the local body, as provided by clause 126 of the Land Act, 1892. On the 13th of January, to proposals having been received from the Pahiatua County Council, 1 again wrote and asked them, as I wanted to try to get all the jtayments made by the Ist of February, to send in their proposals at once. They were cot received until the 20th of January, and then the plana which bad been mads specially to show on what roads the thirds were to be expended were not returned, and the proposal coald nob be checked. After again telegraphing for them, they wore finally received on Monday, the 6th of February. As there were over 1000 proposals to be checked, the board would see it was simply impossible to get them ready fo: the ia*t meeting of the Land Board, and I assert that it Is owing to the delay canned by 1 the Pahiatua County Council officers lo sending in the proposals, and not any caused by the Laud Department, which has prevented the money due to them being paid over- The cheques for the amounts to eight other road boards, who had sent in their proposals as required, were all signed by me on the Btb of this month, and forwarded in due course. Clause 126 threw on the board the onus of seeing that the expenditure was for the benefit of e?leotora from whose land the money was derived, and clause 132 made the local body resprmsiole that it is so spent. Under the previous Act the proposal as sent in by most bodies was bo imperfect that It was nearly impossible to subsequently trace on what roads the board had sanctioned expenditure, and time after time settlers have come to this office and complained that though the expenditure of their thirds had been sanctioned for opening up roads leading to their homesteads, and the money paid to the local body, yet the roads were not made, and no money hid been expended on them. Mr Hogg stated that for the pvt yoxr the Pahiatua County Council, the Eketahuna and Mauriceville Road Boards, and other local bodies had been vainly trying to get thirds accruing. Mr Bak*r asserted that the delay bad been caused by the dilatorinesa of the local bodies in sending in their proposals. Mr Mogg did not think it was right to condemn the local bodies unheard.

Mr B iker said that if theluoal bodies did not send in proposals as required by the Aot the board could do nothing. He denied Mr Hogg’s statement that the fault lay in the unsatisfactory manoer’in wl feh the accounts had been kept*by the Laud Office. Mr Plrani remarked that the Commissioner had taken great pains to ascertain how the thirds were spent in the Mauawatu district.

Mr Moore, clerk to the Pahiatua County Council, who was io attendance, said that the council must take some responsibility fer not having the thirds ready since November last

Mr Piranl thought that the local bodies bad been to blame since November last. In the course of further discussion Mr Baker admitted that the Pahiatua Council’s books were properly kept. The board then considered the proposals for expending thirds from the Mauriceville, Taratahi • Carterton, Kiwitea, Maaterton, Wirokluo, and Pohaogiua Road Boards and the Pahiatua County Council. The proposals wsre agreed to, with the exception of several oases in which there was a difference between the proposals of the selectors and the boards.