A RATING PROBLEM.

Otago Witness, Issue 3867, 24 April 1928, Page 21

A RATING PROBLEM.

FARM AREAS IN BOROUGHS. INQUIRY COMMISSION APPOINTED. WELLINGTON, April 19. When asked to explain the object of the Government in setting up a commission of inquiry in connection with rating matters in the borough of Otaki, Mr A. D. M‘Leod (Minister in Charge of the Valuation Department) made the following statement:— “ The inability of small farmers holding areas within the boroughs and town districts to meet the increasing demands for payment of both general and special rates on their properties has been prominently brought under the notice of the Government in recent years by way of requests for local Bills and for commissions for the purpose o fexcluding their farms from the borough boundaries. In both cases the object is to avoid payment of the heavy borough taxation which, in a growing number of instances, amounts practically to an entire confiscation of the value of the land. It is not uncommon t osee a variation of up to 1600 per cent, in local taxes levied upon one property merely because one portion of it is situated within a boroug and the other in an adjacent county. From a farm-producing point of view both areas are identical, and cannot be used fot any other purpose but for the reason that a road, and in some cases a fence, alone divides such areas. This great dis parity in rates exists. In a few cases local Bills have been passed by Parliament in an endeavour to rectify the anomaly which ia admitted by all concerned, but the most popular means has been by way of a petition to exclude the areas affected from the borough limits. This method, however, does not provide a solution for a number of reasons.

s “ The whole question has been untlei by the Department of Internal Affairs and the Valuation Department for some time, and in view of the fact that H is of such general importance and that such diverse interests are n volved the Government decided to set up a commission to make a comprehensive inquiry into the matter as it obtains in the borough .of Otaki. This commission which consists of Mr R. M. Watson, stipendiary magistrate. Feilding (chairman), Mr W. T. Strand (Mayor of Lower Hutt), and Mr W. Nasi (general secretary of the New Zealand Labour Party, propose to commence its investigations at Otaki on May 8, 122.8. The order of reference submitted for the consideration of this commission is very wide embracing questions relating to boundaries, wards, health, valuations, loans, differential rating, systems of rating, and such other matters relating to the borough as the commission may elect to hear evidence upon. It is hoped that all concerned will co-operate with the commission to that end, and lay before it any information which, may be useful in arriving at a solution of the problem, and thus enable the Government to bring down ’• gislation of general application which, it is hoped, may assure a greater degree of justice

than is possible ugder the present law, particularly in the case of boroughs and town districts of a relatively small popu lation giving little prospect of any material increase in population in the near future.”