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1912, No. 27. The Government Railways Amendment Act, 1912 : This Act provides a new scale of salaries and wages for officers employed in the Government Railways Department. 1912, No. 28. The Public Revenues Amendment Act, 1912 : This Act amends in various respects the Public Revenues Act, 1910. In particular,— Section 5 provides for an annual appropriation of £10,000 out of the Consolidated Fund, to be paid into the common fund of the Public Trust Office, and to be applied from time to time towards the rebuilding or restoration of public buildings destroyed or damaged by fire. If at any time moneys appropriated under this section (with the accumulations thereon) amount to £100,000, no further payment is to be made until the moneys are reduced below that amount. Section 7 makes more effective provision for the recovery by the Audit Office from members of a local authority of moneys illegally expended by it. 1912, No. 29. The Savings-banks Amendment Act, 1912 : This Act amends in various particulars the Savings-banks Act, 1908. Section 3 authorizes the trustees of any bank to pay to any officer of the bank, on retirement from its service, an amount by way of compensation not exceeding the amount of salary received by that officer for the two years immediately preceding his retirement. Section 5 provides for the election by the trustees of one of their number as Deputy VicePresident of the bank, with power to act for the Vice-President on the occasion of the illness or other incapacity of that official. Section 7 extends the powers of trustees with respect to the investment of the funds of the bank. 1912, No. 30. The Aid to Public Works and Land Settlement Act, 1912 : This Act authorizes the Minister of Finance to raise a loan of £1,750,000, to be applied as follows : — (a.) In the construction of railways, £800,000 : (b.) In the purchase of rolling-stock, &c, £300,000 : (c.) In the construction of roads, bridges, and other works for the purposes of land-settlement and goldfields development, £500,000 : (d.) In respect of other public works, £150,000. 1912, No. 31. The Land Laws Amendment Act, 1912 : Part I of this Act makes various amendments of the Land Act, 1908, principally of an administrative nature. Section 3 provides that, before any area of land is subdivided for disposal by sale or lease as a town, a plan of the proposed subdivision, showing the roads and reserves proposed to be made, and the name of the town, shall be submitted to the Governor in Council, and the land shall not be disposed of until the plan so submitted has been approved by the Governor. Section 16 authorizes the Governor to exchange any area of national-endowment land for any area of private land of an approximately equal value, and land so acquired shall thereupon become part of the national endowment. Section 20 provides for the setting-aside of land in a kauri-gum reserve, to be subdivided into allotments not exceeding in any case twenty-five acres in area. Such allotments may be disposed of only to British subjects, to be held under license to occupy with right of purchase or under agreement to purchase on a system of deferred payment to be prescribed by regulations. Where any such allotment is held under license, no rent is to be payable in respect of the first five years of the term. Section 28 provides that on the expiry of any lease of a small grazing-run, and notwithstanding the provisions in the principal Act as to renewal, the area comprised in any such lease may be subdivided, and the allotments thereof disposed of by way of lease for twenty-one years with a perpetual right of renewal for further terms of twenty-one years. The provisions of the principal Act as to renewable leases are, mutatis mutandis, made applicable to leases under this section. Part II confers upon the owners of leases in perpetuity of Crown land the right to purchase the freehold, in the manner and at a price to be determined in accordance with the provisions of that Part. Purchases may be made for cash or by a system of deferred payment extending over a period of not more than nine years. Part 111 makes provision for agreements between the Minister of Lands and the owner in fee-simple of any land for the subdivision of that land, and for the disposal of the allotments by public tender, by sale, or by lease with right of purchase. On the execution of any such agreement the Minister may advance the moneys required for rendering the land available for settlement, including the cost of subdivision and survey and the cost of the construction of roads and bridges. In the case of a sale, the agreement may provide for the payment of the purchase-money by annual instalments extending over a period of from ten to twenty years, with interest on the amount for the time being unpaid not exceeding 5 per centum per annum. In the case of a lease the term shall be for twenty-one years, and the lessee shall have the right at any time during the currency of the lease to purchase the allotment at a price to be named in the tender. The rent payable under the lease shall not exceed 5 per centum per annum of the price so named in the tender. Section 49 provides for similar agreements between the Minister and the owners of Native freehold land in respect of that land. In pursuance of such agreement a proportion (not exceeding one-third) of the proceeds of Native land disposed of under this section may be paid over to the Native owners, and the balance is payable into a Native Land Trust Account, to be invested upon trust for such Native owners.