A NATIVE LEASE.

Poverty Bay Herald, Volume LI, Issue 16871, 28 October 1925, Page 11

A NATIVE LEASE.

LESSEE’S LIABILITY! FOR FEELING TREES. Judgment for plaintiff, To Porou Hirawatu, has been given by the Appeal Court (their Honors the Chief Justice, Mr. Justice Sim, Mr. Justice Reed, Mr. Justice Adams, and Justice Ostler on the bench), against Frances Clara Gardner, in an action brought by rplaintiff to recover damages for the cutting down and sale of trees on-property leased to defendant. Mr. Justice Ostler dissented from the decision of the other Judges ns delivered by Air. Justice Sim.

“The ease raises two questions for determination,’’ said Mr. Justice Him. “The first is whether or not, under such a lease, the tenant has the right, for the purpose of obtaining the profitable enjoyoment of the land, to cut and sell timber trees growing on the land. If he has such u right, the second question is or not what was done by the defendant in the present case can be treated as having been done in exercise of that right.” Their Honors "held that the cutting of the timber had not been done bona tide for the purpose of securing the profitable enjoyment of the land. The cutting of the trees was for the purpose of making an immediate profit out of the timber. It was done without any regard to the improvement of the land,- and without any idea of making it suitable for use as a farm by the defendant or anyone else. The plaintiff and his co-tenants were the owners in foe of the reversion, and they* were entitled to recover the proceeds of sale. The other owners would have to be joined as plaintiffs in the Supreme Court. Judgment, was entered in their favor for £OOO, with costs according to scale. In the opinion of Mr. Justice Ostler, the intention of the lessee when she sold the timber, was irrelevant. By the terms of the lease and the circumstances of the ease in consideration of i 8» substantial rental the lessors had abandoned all rights to the timber.They had given the lessee the right to destroy or sell it. ______