question of whether applicants had sufficient land left was assessed by the Native Land Court. But the minutes of the court, in these years, suggest that proper enquiry whether applicants had sufficient lands left was practically non-existent. In general, the statement of the applicant was accepted, and recorded instances of checks on those claims, or rejections of applications, are rare. The impact of this combination of easing legislative requirements, and a declining exercise of Government responsibility is delineated in case studies of the rapid dissipation of lands reserved from the sale of parent blocks at Te Aroha, Ohinemuri, Waikawau, and Moehau.
Chapter IV: Impact of Public Works and Development in the Early Twentieth Century
The fourth chapter discusses the environmental impact of the Government's purchase, development and public works policies for the Hauraki people in the early twentieth century. The first part of this discussion focuses on the deepening effects of mining on the lives of the Hauraki people, even though most of them had long ceased to receive any direct benefit from the opening of their lands to the Government's jurisdiction. The ability of Maori to rely on rivers for drinking water, whitebait, and eels, the value of their cultivations, and the integrity of wahi tapu in riparian blocks were severely affected by the discharge of mining debris, tailings, and cyanide into watercourses under permissive Government legislation. The evidence is limited, but suggests that Government officials tended to give priority to the more apparent interests of economic development in assessing whether waterways should be exploited for dumping, and to the claims of Europeans in assessing damage, even though their reliance on natural water sources was lesser in degree than that of Maori.
Drainage of the Hauraki Plains
The theme of Maori resource and land loss as a result of the Government's development goals and public works schemes is explored in more depth with reference to the draining of the Hauraki Plains. A number of factors came together at the turn of the century to threaten Maori control and retention of this area which was valued for its bird and fish resource rather than for the quality of the cultivable soil. Included here were the development of the dairy export industry which gave kahikatea a new value for butter boxes, and a boom in the flax industry also demanding wood as fuel for the stampers, enhanced technological capabilities which permitted large-scale drainage works, and the Government's increasing responsiveness to demands for land for conversion into dairy farms. Crown purchase for the draining of the delta lands was facilitated by the Maori Land Settlement Act 1905 (discussed previously at pp. 77–83) and by public works legislation—both the general enactment of 1908 and the Hauraki Plains Act also passed that year. Some 1922 acres had been acquired under the legislation by 1911, and another 1,212 acres by 1925. In setting compensation levels the Government applied rules which ensured that it retained the benefits from drainage work for itself. Under the betterment principle which operated until 1920, any additional value resulting from public works was not taken into account in assessing compensation.
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