THE LAND BILL

New Zealand Times, Volume XXXVI, Issue 8265, 30 October 1912, Page 5

THE LAND BILL

ADI MASSEY’S REPLY TO CRITICISM.

Replying to criticism on the third reading of the Land Bill, tho Prime Minister stated in tho House early yesterday morning that tho so-called arguments against the Bill were merely parrot repetitions. The Bill had stood every tost of criticism. One would have thought from certain speeches the leasehold system would bring in the millennium, but that system had failed in other countries. Had members read what happened after the Franco-Prus-sian war, when a huge indemnity was forthcoming from the small freeholders of France? Flo was aiming at making New Zealand prosperous by a system of freehold, and ho believed he was, with tho aid of his friends, going to be successful. The graduated tax and the Lands for Settlement Act made for limitation ns well as the, clauses of this Bill. There was no parallel between the land system of England and that of this country. It was because we had free trad© in land that the breaking-up process was going on. Ho instanced large areas which had been broken up in Waikato and Canterbury. In ten years, ho believed, there would scarcely bo a largo estate left. Members talked about “ our national heritage,” but it was like the blessed' word Mesopotamia. Ho contested the argument that limitation was not provided for in tho Bill. He was quite willing to adopt tho French system by which large owners were compelled to subdivide. He was thinking of New Zealand as a whole in this Bill, but he proposed, in regard to Canterbury to administer tho Lands for Settlement Act more vigorously than before. It finances allowed, they intended to keep on in this work of acquiring estates and subdivision. There was a tremendous amount of misrepresentation in regard to small and large farmers: Could any member show him a clause which would benefit tho large owner? Ho believed this was the most important Land Bill introduced for twenty years—(Opposition laughter)—and it was an honest attempt to put the holders of small grazing runs in a better position. He would see that no injustice was done to them. This Bill was not the whole of the Government’s land policy. !