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REPOBT. Native Land Court Office, Wellington, 30th Jiine, 1911. To His Excellency the Governor of the Dominion of New Zealand. M w ir please Your Excellency,' — In exercise of the powers conferred on me by Commission dated the litli day of April. 1911, and published in bhe Gazette and Kahili of the 13th April Inst. 1 have to report that on the 25th April, at Kaiapoi, I commenced the inquiry thereby directed into the circumstances connected with the dispositions by will of lands situated in and forming part of the Kaiapoi Reserve and subsequent dealings therewith. Such inquiry was continued from day to day until the loth May last. The facts and circumstances connected with the dispositions by will were not difficult of ascertainment, but I have found it extremely hard to decide on the most suitable method of straightening out the titles to the various sections affected, and. with every desire to do justice to the claims of owners and other persons affected, to suggest some solution of the trouble that will not do great injury to some or other of those interested. Therefore, to this report, expressing my own views, 1 have, with the object of enabling others to easily grasp the position, attached the following: — (1.) Notes of opening addresses of counsel, of evidence taken as to the circumstances affecting the reserves as a whole, and of the closing addresses of counsel (Appendix A). (2.) Particulars of leases (Appendix B). (3.) Government valuation of sections in dispute (Appendix C). (4.) A short report on each such section, setting out the facts and my own conclusions thereon (Appendix D). Some outline of the history of this Kaiapoi Reserve is necessary to explain the position of the titles at the present day. In 1848 the New Zealand Land .Company purchased from the Maori owners a large tract of country in the Provincial District of Canterbury. This was known as " Kemp's purchase. ,- and the deed of sale contained the following provisions for the benefit of the Maori owners : " Our places of residence and cultivation* are to be reserved for us and our ohild/ren oiler us. And ii shall be for the Governor to set apart some portion for us when the land is surveyed, bul the greater part of the land is unreservedly given up to the Europeans for ever." The Kaiapoi Reserve, of 2,640 acres, came into being as a consequence of the above provision, the Natives claiming it as a place of residence and cultivation, and. as such, specially reserved from the sale. In 1859 the late Sir Walter Buller (then Mr. Buller) was instructed to report upon the Kaiapoi and other Native reserves, and did so on the Ist March. 1862 (see Appendix to the .Journals of the House of Representatives. 1862. E. 5). He reported that a scheme of subdivision had been agreed on by the Kaiapoi Natives, dividing part of the reserve into 122 sections, the same to be for Natives named in a list attached to his report. He further stated that it should be " a fundamental condition of the proposed grants that the estates and interests created thereby should be entailed so as to make them inalienable to persons of other than tin' Maori race." Some 111 grants were subsequently issued in accordance with Mr. Buller's subdivision, each grant containing a clause as under: " Provided that no disposition of the land included in this grant by way of sale, mortgage, lease, or otherwise shall be made without the consent in writing indorsed thereon of the Governor, or some person duly appointed by him or otherwise duly authorized by law in that behalf. Provided also that upon the death of the grantee the Governor may, without prejudice to any sale, mortgage, lease, or other disposition made with such consent as hereinbefore mentioned, direct the succession and dispose of such land in accordance with the provisions of the Intestate Natives Succession Act. 1861. or otherwise according to the law in that behalf lor the time being in. force." These grants are dated tin' I'.Mh day of September, 1865, and are beaded " Under the Crown Grants Act (No. 2), 1862." though there is no recital in the grants stating under which Act the Governor purported bo issue them.

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