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Native Land Purchases.

Letter No. I.

Wellington.

I shall not attempt to describe the scenery and the attractions of the famous lake district of Rotorua and Rotomahana, nor the wonderful hot springs in their neighbourhood. They have been already so well described in your columns that it would be needless repetition. But, on my return, I happened to get to Gisborne when the now well-known Commission was sitting to inquire into the report of Mr J. A. Wilson, the Government land purchaser of that district, who had made in that report some grave statements respecting difficulties thrown in his way as an officer of the Government by other officers. He stated that the effect of their action and of that of the Native Lands Court itself had been to facilitate the purchase of native lands by private individuals, to the prejudice of the Government and of the public service. I took much interest in this inquiry, and have accumulated information about the whole system, and the conduct of these land purchasers in particular, which will, I think, be of interest to your readers. It is a system peculiar to the North Island. In the South there are few who know anything whatever about it; yet it plays, and has long played, a very important part in the secret history of New Zealand politics, and has moulded them materially during the last few years. It rallies now round the Government—a powerful body of influential (because wealthy) supporters—and it is charged with demoralising both the Government and the branch of the public service devoted to this peculiar duty of native management and native land purchasing. Certain it is that on all sides I am told that officers who honestly and faithfully did their duty, and who refused to connive in any way at the alienation of these lands to wealthy private buyers, were not in favour, and stood little chance of promotion. Those, on the other hand, who were more pliant or less scrupulous, were the pets of the Native department, and brought indirectly no small political page 8 support to the Ministry in this part of the Colony. This is one of the charges generally made and openly talked about in connection with the native land purchasing. Other charges of favouritism in behalf of friends and connections, and even of personal corruption, are not less freely made. The report of Mr Wilson, to which I have referred, brought the matters to a head. It was sent to the late Native Minister in June last, and was kept back by the Government, on various pleas, from presentation to the Assembly. The chief plea -was, that it contained grave charges against the officers and against the Judge of the District Lands Court, which it would be unfair to make public until they had been fully inquired into. This plea was admitted by the House after several angry discussions. Sir Julius Vogel denounced what he called "the leakage" of this report, and its existence having been allowed to become known. He regretted that honourable members should have put themselves into communication with Government officers merely to obtain information for party purposes—an insinuation levelled at Sir George Grey, but which every one in the House knew to be unfounded. I have 6ince learned, on the most unquestionable authority, that Sir G. Grey and Mr Wilson have not for years held the slightest communication with each other, and that they were not., in fact, on very good terms, from former differences of opinion on native affairs between them. Sir Donald naturally did all he could to prevent its publication, and between, them the report was not presented.

After the session, a Committee was appointed to inquire into it. The Commission consisted only of Dr Giles, the Resident Magistrate of Wanganui, and of Major Brown, the head of the Native Office in that hot-bed of difficulty from native land purchasing—Taranaki. These gentlemen were both of them Government officials, dependent on the Government for their welfare, and with a natual esprit to which such a report as that of Mr Wilson would appear a heresy. Personally they may be all that could be desired, and for my own part, I know neither of them. But a Commission, to command the public confidence in so grave a matter, should assuredly have been composed of others than Government servants only. The Commission sat for some weeks, and conducted the inquiry in a way that called for frequent protests from Mr Wilson. It took evidence and rejected evidence at its pleasure, and finally reported that the statements made in the report were not substantiated. Dr Pollen, the new Native Minister, at once dismissed Mr Wilson, and the whole matter will now, I am informed, be brought up by that gentleman before the Assembly. I am also told that no copy of the Commissioners' report was sent to Mr Wilson, and no chance given to him of commenting in any way upon it. Summary page 9 dismissal followed its receipt by the Government. Yet Mr Wilson—if he erred at all—could only have done so in his zeal for the public service and in his desire to faithfully perform the duties of his office. His personal character stands, and has always stood, as high as possible. Not a shadow of suspicion has ever attached to him during a long service. He has the complete confidence of the natives, and was in every respect one of the best officers in the Native Department. But he has always had strong opponents among those whose path in land purchasing he crossed. All his own interests pointed to quietness and laisser aller. Promotion and the goodwill of powerful Government supporters in his district would thus have been secured. He acted otherwise. He did his best to protect the public interests. There is not the least imputation of other motive against him on any side, and yet he, after purchasing over half-a-million acres, has been treated as though he were an enemy instead of a zealous, faithful, public servant.

A report which involves such enormous interests as these land purchases represent, and which has met with so singular a reception, will be sure to excite much comment before it is done with. I have not been able to get a copy yet, but am promised one, and will send it to you when I receive it. I have heard enough, however, to enable me to describe it as a clear and masterly statement of the difficulties in the way of successful land purchase unless the Government and all its servants honestly, vigorously, and firmly support their own land purchasers, regardless of personal or political considerations. These difficulties I cannot pretend to give from Mr Wilson's report till I have the expected copy. But from my own inquiries, the most serious have arisen from the manner in which the Native Lands Acts were officially administered. Officials are said, in effect, to have played into the hands of those private purchasers who have acquired great landed estates in defiance of the law, and to have given them unfair advantages over those who were acting for the Government. The latter have no secret service money at their command for the bribery of natives and others, and the purpose of every penny of expenditure has to be openly stated, and accounted for to the satisfaction of the Colonial Auditors. Of course there can be no complaint of this last. It is perfectly right and proper that it should be so, but it is also right and proper that officers so placed should receive the cordial support and aid of all officers of the Government, to enable them to overcome the difficulties inherent in their position.

Some of these points were touched upon in Mr Wilson's annual report. It caused a profound sensation at the time among those aware of its character, and the gravity of its state- page 10 ments. They were only statements that had been made a thousand times before by private persons, and public writers, but it was the first time they had been officially made by one conversant with everything that had been done. It is also commonly said that so long as land purchasers could show big acreages in their returns, the Government cared very little if the acreages consisted chiefly of sand hills and inaccessible and barren lands; while, at the same time, private persons (but only rich and influential private persons) were walking off with the fat lands in smaller acreages in the same district. The shells fell to the public. The oysters went to those whose friendship the Government valued, and whose enmity no Government has yet had strength or courage to face. It is admitted on all sides that this has been done, and that, while hundreds of thousands of acres have been bought by rich men, or companies, there is no single instance of a man having been able to purchase a hundred or a few hundred acres for his smaller requirements and personal settlement.

Another grave consideration in connection with these land purchases, is that the Maoris are made dissatisfied and discontented. They feel they are being "done," and their minds are further poisoned by private agents whom they find practically supported by Government, and with greater means at their command than the agents of Government possess. The real owners also often find themselves opposed by other claimants intentionally set up by these private agents to induce the owners to come to their terms. I was astonished, on inquiry, to find how serious this last matter had become. To understand its full import, you must remember the innumerable peculiar bases on which a Maori title can be rested. There are, for example, asserted personal rights from all kinds of asserted relationship, asserted gifts from chiefs long dead, asserted occupation or conquest, asserted marriage dowries, or asserted gifts for alleged aid in helping the tribe of the reputed owners to revenge themselves on some other tribe at some remote date, perhaps ton or twelve generations past. The shifting of boundaries is another good pretext; but these are only a few of the thousand-and-one grotesque grounds on which native land titles are often based and disputed. Nor should that most complex of all titles—the Mana—be forgotten. This Mana is the right universally recognised by all Natives in the chief of a tribe to prohibit the alienation of land belonging to any member of the tribe. The Mana, from its vagueness, is a great card among manufacturers of bogus claims to land for opposition sake. But, when genuine, it is a very serious matter to overlook it, as we had reason to know when the first Taranaki war broke out. That war was proximately caused, it will be remembered, by the obstinate page 11 refusal of Mr M'Lean, as Chief Land Purchase Commissioner, to acknowledge Wi Kingi's Mana over the Waitara land sold to the Government by Te Teira.

Enough for this letter. I will go into the matter again as soon as I have the papers which are promised to me, and I think you will find them extremely interesting. I have said enough to give you an idea, I hope, of the general character of Mr Wilson's report, and of the notorious and long-talked-of evils of the system. You can readily see how important a part the Land Court plays in dealing with claims, and how many and various are the questions depending on the right judgment and freedom from bias of its judges. The Courts are called together when and where the judge pleases. He hears the case as he pleases, and admits or rejects what evidence he pleases. Counsel is not allowed, and from the nature of things, the difficulties and tedium of proceedings, largely conducted in a foreign tongue, and the out-of-the-way places in which Courts are often held, there is practically no publicity, and the judge's authority is supreme. Happily, complaint against the judges has not been heard in any case until now. There is, therefore, the greater reason why the statements made so clearly, and with such evident sincerity, by Mr J. A. Wilson should be thoroughly investigated by others than the mere subordinate officials to whom that investigation has been so far relegated.