I.—3b.

12

[T. W. FISHER.

The Chairman, Waimarino County Council, Raetihi. Ohotu—Karioi Road. 13th March, 1911. I understand your Council is now arranging a loan of £3,000 for expenditure on roading on this road through the Ohotu Block, in order to give access by way of Fields Track and this road to the holdings of John Wilkie and others as far as the Township Reserve. Mr. Wilkie has interviewed me on the matter, and asked me to advise youi Council of the attitude of the Hoard and the assistance it is prepared to give. Hence this letter. The Board, after conferring with Mi-. T. W. Fisher, the former President, has decided, during the balance of the first term of the leases over the lands served (say, for fifteen years from the Ist April, 1911), to pay a subsidy of £52 10s. per annum, being at the rate of 3i per cent, on £1,500, as its contribution towards this roading expenditure. At the expiry of the current leases the lands will become liable for the full rate, and the rate charged will then be a deduction from the unimproved value, on which the new rentals will then be assessed. You will thus see, although it may be necessary to strike a full rate for £3,000 for the purpose of giving security for the loan, that the full rate will not need to be collected. In order to give every assistance to get roading under way, the Board is prepared to advance progress payments up to £1,500 until the loan is granted, on condition that all such advances are refunded out of the loan-moneys when the latter are received. J. 15. Jack, President.

Waimarino County Council, Raetihi, 12th April, 1911. J. B. Jack, Esq., President, Aotea District Maori Land Board, Wanganui. Sir, — Re Ohotu-Karioi Road /.nan. I have the honour, by direction of the Waimarino County Council, to acknowledge the receipt of your memorandum of the 13th March in reference to the above, and in reply have to advise that my Council are taking steps to raise the loan under the State-guaranteed Advances Act, 1909. The annual instalment of principal and interest prescribed undei the Act is £4 17s. fid. per cent., made up as follows: Interest, 3A per cent.; principal, Ij} per cent. It will, of course, be necessary to strike a rate sufficient to pay the amount of the instalment plus 10 per cent., as required by the Act, but only a sufficient portion will be levied each year to pay the amount of the instalments as they fall due. In reference to your Board's offer to grant advance progress payments up to £1,500 until the loan is granted, on condition that all such advances are refunded out of the loan-moneys when the latter are received, the Council regret that they cannot take advantage of the offer, as the Department will not grant a loan upon works already executed. I have, &c., A. MabbOTT, County Clerk.

1. The Chairman.] Is it true, Mr. Fisher, that the Public Works Department have persistently and consistently refused to assist in any way. with road votes for the purpose of improving the roads, the European occupiers of lands leased from the Maoris' I have no direct knowledge of that. 2. I have just bad a reply from the Minister of Public Works —and 1 have had quite a number —that as these lands are Maori lands in which the Crown is not interested, the Governmenl cannot see its way to assist by giving subsidies or other assistance .' -The only case in connection with which I ever came into contact with the Public Works Department was when Mr. Duigan, Mr. Wilkie. and others petitioned the Board [or a bridge on the I'i.-hls Track Road —the Wanganui-Zarioi Road. That being a Government arterial road. I considered it was the duty of the Government to open up that road. On that occasion I interviewed the Public Works Department on the matter, with the result that we arranged that the Hoard should pax half the cost of the bridge. 3. Speaking generally, then, you do not know?—l do not know of any refusal. You must consider this particular block —the Ohotu Block. The Parapara Road is a Government Road, and was surveyed before the Ohotu Block was surveyed. The Fields Track is another arterial road — a Government road in the same position. If grants were refused for those two roads by the Public Works Department, the Department were evidently under a misapprehension as to the position. 4. I have just got a reply from the Public Works Department, and it is similar to probably a couple of dozen that I have received during the past two or three years. The settlers in the Maihiihi Special-farm District, near Te Kuiti, asked that the road should be surveyed further along and roadwork put in hand, and the reply of the Minister is that as the survey and making of this road would be for the purpose of improving Maori lands, which are not Crown lands, the Department cannot see it way to accede to the application?—l can follow that. You are speaking of what are actually Native lands —that is, lands owned by Natives and dealt with by themselves. But the Ohotu lands are in a different position. They are lands vested in the Maori Land Board and dealt with by the Board. There is a difference. 5. But these particular settlers have lands that are leased from the Maoris through the Maori Land Board? —All the Board does in this case is to see thai the Natives receive fair and equitable treatment. 6. The point is that the Department resolutely sets its face against, assisting the- settlers by subsidies or by grants in matters of this sort?—ln this case it does not, because the Act says it shall do it. It says the Government may contribute an equal amount, or some lesser sum (section 276, Native Land Act, 1909).