472 • MINUTES OP EVIDENCE SEIOEE SELECT COMMITTEE A.
Cuninghame, Selection of a Section could be ensured.
With regard to the Lands in what EsZ-are by the new Regulations termed the intermediate and unsettled Districts, it ifitl Ju7~i847 '1S quite clear that ll' an Acre is far Dey°n(i their Value > and ^ seems very y
hard that the Occupants of these Lands should be prevented from indulging their natural Desire for Ownership of the Soil, except at a Price Three or Four Times exceeding the real Value of the Land.
I should propose to allow every Leaseholder in these Districts to select One or Two Sections for every 4,000 Sheep he paid for, a Value to be placed on such Sections by a Land Board, which should assume, as a Standard of such Valuation, that average agricultural Land within Twenty-five Miles of Melbourne is worth 1/.
an Acre.
A minimum Valuation might be placed on such Sections of Land in the inter¬ mediate Districts, and a lower Minimum in the unsettled Districts.
The Price might be paid by easy annual Instalments, and the Grant issued when the full Price, with Interest, had been paid.
It would be requisite somewhat to modify this System in the Sydney District, on account of the much lower average Value of the Land there.
4439.
In what respect do you think that this Change would be preferable to the present System ?
A greater Quantity of Land could be purchased under that System than under the present System.
4440.
Do you think that the total Money Amount realized by the Land Sales under your System would be greater or less than under the present System ?
I have not the least Doubt that a greater Amount would be realized under that System than under the present.
4441.
You mean a greater immediate Amount, not a greater prospective Amount ?
Perhaps not a greater prospective Amount; but even regarding the prospec¬ tive Amount/supposing that by the Sale of 5,000 Acres, now at a lower Price, Emigrants are immediately introduced, the First Result is that the natural Increase of that Emigrant Population now introduced would in some Five or Six and Twenty Years amount to double, and consequently it would be as good as double the Price procured Twenty-five Years afterwards j but secondly, during that Twenty-five Years those 5,000 Emigrants are increasing the Value of every Species of Property in the Colony, and the Colony would be far richer by the Introduction of those 5,000 Emigrants now, and one may say the Loss or Alienation of 5,000 Acres of Land, than it would be by twice' that Number Twenty-five Years afterwards; so that the real Gain is greater, both to tbe Population and to the general Wealth of the Colony, by a larger immediate Introduction of Emigrants and a greater Alienation of Land.
4442.
Might not this Diminution of the Price induce Emigrants to purchase larger Tracts than they have the Means and Capital to cultivate ?
£1 an Acre is at this Moment more than usually could be given with Advan¬ tage for Land.
I should wish to support the ll.
an Acre System within certain Limits, chiefly because I think that some Consideration is due to those who have been induced by the Government to buy at very high Prices before, hut practically from the great Quantity of indifferent Land which exists in every Section set up.
I think [that upon the average round Melbourne I may say that there is not above One Fourth of each Section which is fit for Agriculture.
The Result is, that upon the Average ll.
an Acre would be 4sl.
for each agri¬ cultural Acre; the rest is very useful to the Farmer for depasturing his Milch Cows, his Bullocks, or other Stock, but not at all fit for Agriculture.
4443.
To whom would you leave the Determination of the minimum Price in the intermediate and remoter Districts ?
I should propose that that should be done by a Board to be appointed hy the Executive in the Colony.
4444.
Varying the Price from Time to Time, according to the Demand and other Circumstances ?
Yes; varying from Time to Time; clearly not, however, being reduced from Time to Time, because it is not a good Principle at one Time to raise the Price so high as that afterwards it has to be reduced.
There is always a Sense
of
