“UNPRACTICAL FARMERS”

Sun (Auckland), Volume III, Issue 662, 14 May 1929, Page 10

“UNPRACTICAL FARMERS”

MAORI SPEAKS PLAINLY ABOUT PAKEHA NATIVE LEASES PROBLEM . (Special to THE ST. iS ) TE KUITI, Monday. That hardships among European farmers in the King Country causing them to suffer under native leases was often the fruit of ignorance and the consequences of unpractical farming was the blunt statement of the Maniapoto chief. Tuwhakaririka Patene (Peter Barton), speaking on behalf of 30 Maoris today before the Native Land Leases Commission. rr'HE chief said it was not through high rentals that the Pakeha farmer suffered, but through exorbitant sums paid to other Europeans for goodwill. “We do not want the conditions or terms of the leases altered in any way,” bluntly declared the chief. “Where there is provision for compensation the terms of compensation are provided for in the leases, he added. Where there was no provision for compensation the native owners wanted the position left at that. Barton said many of the leases had been taken up for purely speculative purposes. Parliament, he thought, should legislate against that and prevent Europeans front selling leased land until they had held it for 10 years. Judge MacCormiek. chairman of the commission, said the point was that many thousands of acres of leased kands were falling back in value and the lessees were on some cases walking off because of their conditions. It was for the Maoris to consider whether they wanted to have all the leases abandoned. It was not adt isable, as Barton had suggested, to wait until the leases expired and then see what would happen. The natives must consider tha. it their leases were abandoned they would not get the same rents as in the past, because people were nowscared of native leases, many of which would not be taken up at all. The commission did not propose to make the natives suffer anything more than it thought would be ultimately for their good. If it recommended relief for the lessees it would be because it considered the natives would ultimately lose by the present conditions. They might have to put up w-ith some present loss, on paper, but tne land would not stand the carrying out of the existing contracts m their entirety. The commission had to try to preserve the lands so that they would not be thrown back in a state of ruin. , ' Of the settlers who came before the commission to-day the principal case was that of Mr. Rodolph Boddy, of Boddy Bros, and Harper, farmers on a large scale. He and other farmers emphasised the hardship to settlers from having to contend with noxious weeds spreading from adjoining Crown and native lands