POLITICAL NOTES.

Taranaki Herald, Volume 16, Issue 14, 16 October 1909, Page 2

POLITICAL NOTES.

MR. OKEY'S QUESTIONS. (Telegraphed by Our Parliamentary Reporter.) • t WELLINGTON, Oct. 15. > Notice has been given by Mr. Okej to ask the Minister in charge of the Advances to Settiere Department whether, seeing that the business done bj the department in the Taranaki provincial district is the third largest in the dominion, he will take the necest ski- steps to open an office of the i department in the town of New Ply- . mouth, that being the moat convenient place tor the business of the district. Mr. Okey presented to the House a largely signed petition from the resi- '- dent* of the Omata Riding of the Taran aki County praying that the riding be constituted a separate county. LARGE ESTATES. The aggregation of large estates was a subject dealt with by Mr. Hogg in his Address-in-Reply speech. Between 1891 and 1907, he said, over 18.000,000 acres of Crown lands had been settled, and about one-third of that huge area had passed into the hands of fifty-one persons. In 1891 there were 31 estates of over 50,000 acres, totalling an area of 2,600,000 acres. In 1907 those 31 rotates had increased to 88, each of over 50,000 acres, totalling an area of over 8,880,000 acres. [If Mr. Hogg had compared 1903-4 with 1907-8 he would have found quite a different state of things. In the former year there were 106 holdings over 50,000 acres, aggregating 10,168,242 acres, while last year there were only 84 such estates, aggregating 8,409.298 acres. Further, he will find that, excluding Crown pastoral leases, the average area of occupied holdings was 382 acres in 1903-4 and 363 acres in 1907-8, showing that disintegration is taking place.— Ed. T.H.]