H.—27.

1876. NEW ZEALAND.

RENT OF THE PRINCES STREET RESERVE, (CORRESPONDENCE RESPECTING).

Return to an Order of the Mouse of Representatives, No. 2, 28th June, 1876. " That copies of the correspondence between Hori Kerei Taiaroa, Te One Topi Patuki, and the Government, respecting the rent of the Princes Street Reserve, be laid upon the table of this House."— (Mr. Taiaroa?)

No. 1. Governor Sir G. Grey to His Grace the Duke of Buckingham. Mt Lord Duke, — Government House, Wellington, Bth October, 1867. I have the honor to transmit, for your Grace's information, a petition which has been addressed to Her Majesty by John Topi Patuki, Chief of the Ngaitahu and Ngatirnamoe tribes. This petition relates to a reserve in Princes Street, Dunedin, in the Province of Otago, which was made for the Natives in the year 1853, and has now become of very considerable value. I enclose, for your Grace's information, a memorandum which my Responsible Advisers have prepared upon the enclosed petition, the allegations contained in which, they state, are for the most part correct. Your Grace will find from this memorandum, that my Responsible Advisers, at a meeting of the Executive Council, inadvertently advised me to sign a Crown grant, dated the 11th day of January, 1860, by which the reserve in dispute was granted to the Superintendent of the Province of Otago, and which grant I signed in ignorance of what I was doing. I also enclose, for your Grace's information, copies of the explanations made upon this subject in the House of Representatives, by the Hon. the Colonial Secretary, and the Hon. J. C. Richmond, the Minister for Native Affairs. Upon inquiry, I find that the sum of £6,031 12s. 9d., accrued rents, was upon the 24th ultimo, paid over to the Superintendent of Otago, as following the grant. I have thus put your Lordship in possession of all requisite information in reference to a case which I sincerely desired should have been compromised in a generous spirit towards the Natives of the Middle Island, who parted with large tracts of land to this Government for an almost nominal consideration. I have, &c, His Grace the Duke of Buckingham. George Geet.

' No. 2. Memorandum by the Hon. Mr. Richmond. Refeering to a question put by His Excellency in conversation on the subject of the Princes Street Reserve, Dunedin, I have made inquiry and find that the Attorney-General advised that no appropriation was necessary to authorize the Colonial Treasurer to pay over the accrued rents to the grantee. He did not, however, express any opinion on the question, whether the rents ought or ought not to follow a grant made under circumstances so peculiar as those of the present case. His Excellency stated that he thought that the expense of a suit for testing the validity of the grant should be borne out of the accrued rents of the reserve. That fund is no longer in the Treasury, but it is in his Excellency's power to order payment out of other rents of Native Reserves, in which the claimants to Princes Street Reserve, amongst other persons, are interested. Ministers cannot, of course, offer any objection to a payment which His Excellency's personal connection with several proceedings relating to the Princes Street Reserve give him a peculiar right to direct. Wellington, 23rd October, 1867. J. C. Richmond.