Ohinemuri District: Ohinemuri

1st That every effort during the present sitting of the Court should be made to obtain as many signatures to the deed of conveyance as possible.

2nd That as one reason why the remaining grantees will not sign is that 5/- per acre is not value for the land with its Gold fields revenue, that the price per acre be fixed now not to exceed 7/6d per acre.

3rd That the money overpaid the 43 grantees be taken to be expenses in connection with the acquiring of the land.

4th That the sum of L5714–6–0d underpaid to the 150 grantees who signed the conveyance before their shares or interest in the land were known, be paid the balance due to each of them.

5th That the Court be requested then to ascertain what interest Her Majesty may have in the land, and cut out an area proportionate to the interest acquired by purchase, as well as for money advanced to those grantees who now refuse to complete the sale of their interest.

The sum required to complete the title of the whole block as above would be:

If this arrangement can be carried out, Government would secure the whole of the Ohinemuri Gold Field block (passed the Native Land Court), 73,431 acres, at a cost of, including payments to Natives and every incidental expenses, £37,981–18–3d or 10/4d per acre.

Should it not be competent to purchase all the grantees' interest, then the area and money would be reduced at the rate of 7/6d for each acre. In this case, I would recommend that any land cut out of block by the Court and awarded to the Native owners should be made strictly inalienable, as well as being made subject to Gold Field Regulations.

A further matter to be considered is the carrying out of the promises made respecting the several reserves to be set apart for the owners of this land.

The deed of lease dated February 1875 specifies that "Reserves for Native occupation and residence at Waihi and Mataora shall be set aside and proclaimed, and such reserves shall not be subject to the provisions of the Gold Fields Act". The area of these reserves does not appear to have been fixed, this should if possible be done during the during the sitting of the Court at Ohinemuri, and the Court requested to order the names of the people to whom the reserves should be granted. The land to be made inalienable in any way unless with consent of the Governor.

In the deed of conveyance now being signed is the following provision:

"And in consideration of the conveyance heretofore made, Her said Majesty doth hereby covenant and agree with the said Vendors that Her said Majesty or her successors will make good and effectual Grants or Conveyances to the said Vendors, the names of whom are set out in the several schedules hereto numbered [blank space] hereunto annexed of the several pieces or parcels of land being severally parcels of the blocks of land hereby conveyed mentioned in the said schedules, but so that each of such Grants or conveyances shall be to each set of the Vendors jointly as are mentioned in each of such schedules, and shall to each of such sets be of the land only which are mentioned in the same schedule in which the names of such set appears. Provided that in each of such Grants or Conveyances there shall be inserted a provision or condition that the land to be so granted or conveyed as aforesaid shall not be alienated by sale, mortgage, lease or otherwise without the previous consent of the Governor in Council thereto first obtained.

Here again the specific reserves have not been named or the area. This matter is one that the Natives residing on the land are most anxious to have settled. Mr Mackay appears to have

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