The Opunake Times. FRIDAY, MAY 22, 1896. LESSEES’ LEAGUE.

Opunake Times, Volume IV, Issue 197, 22 May 1896, Page 2

The Opunake Times. FRIDAY, MAY 22, 1896. LESSEES’ LEAGUE.

In another column we publish correspondence which has passed between the Secretary of the League and the Premier. Judging by the Piemier’s letter it is evident that very little assistance may be looked for from the present Government, who are apparently as much under the thumb of the Trustee as the lessees themselves. We must candidly admit that we admire the strength of will and doggedness of the Trustee which enables him to flaunt successive members of the Cabinet, who have approached him on the subject, and this latest letter of the Premier’s bears the stamp of having been dictated by the Public Trustee, as it accords so beautifully with communications direct from him. The Premier may be the strong man and bully which his friends and foes take pleasure in depicting him as, but when he comes nnder the flame of the Trusttee’s tallow dip he is as softest wax. He works off the Trustee’s old saw that the trust is for the benefit of the natives, not the lessees. Ha might have saved himself the trouble of the reply as all the lessees were well aware of that to their cost. What the lessees claim, and rightly too, is that when the trust was set up it was to be for the joint benefit of lessees and natives, but that since Mr Ballance’s strong hand was removed that it has developed into its present lop-sided and red tape shape. He, overflowing with virtuous indignation, is horrified at the bare thought of interfering with the Trustee in carrying out his sacred duties, but he might bear in mind with advantage that iho Trustee also holds other trusts, one of which is the million and a half under the Advances to Settlers, and that this same Premier has been publicly boasting of himself, and the Minister of Lands attending the meetings of the Lending Board, of which the Trustee is superintendent, and cutting the strings of the money bags so that it might flow freely amongst the people, but we suppose in that instance some of the supporters of the Government were suffering, which, of course, would alter the case entirely. With regard to the proposal that the Government should buy the lands not required by the natives for occupation, and thus convert the lessees into crown tenants ; he says it is obviously the duty of the Government to be careful to see that in all proposals for legislation the rights of private parties may not be violated. ' That sounds very fine and is unquestionably honest, but how does it tally with his and his colleagues’ boasts from one eud of the colony to the other that they are determined to burst up the big estates of private individuals, which have been vested in their present owners by law, so as to effect au arbitrary transfer of such estates from one party to another party. Further, if it would be such a heinous crime to v , purchase native waste lands on the West Coast, how does it come to be such a virtue for the Minister of Lands to boast of the hundreds of thousands of acres of native lands acquired in other parts from 2s 6d an acre upwards or downwards, If it would be doing a wrong to the natives on this/ coast to purchase their lands at an abnormally high comparative value, then it is nothing more nor less than downright robbery securing native lands in other districts at a mere nominal value. In other parts of the Island they draw comparisons, favorable to themselves at haying purchased native lands of better quality and at a cheaper price than their predecessors or opposition friends, but all this only goes to show when judged by the standard of honesty set up now by the Premier that they are justified in depriving Europeans or Maoris anywhere else than on the West Coast of their land

at a value to be fixed by the Government. He tlien goes on to say it would.not be proper that the Trustee should be interfered with in any way in the administration of his trust, which should be as independent as the administration of the Courts of Justice. We think the people would feel very grateful if they were satisfied the Courts of Justice were as independent of control or influence as the Truster insists on being.