and Enterprise
pp. 29-30 · Read in the full issue
Rich And Idle Lands In
New Hebrides
How Condominium Paralyses Initiative and Enterprise
AN Australian who went to the New Hebrides since the end of the war has written to the PIM, asking why Press and politicians do not do some thing to compel “the big companies’’ to aive up some of their grip on the New Hebrides lands, and thus encourage new settlement and production.
“These islands will grow anything, and run any kind of stock,” says our corres pondent. “So why not open them up for selection, before they are over-run by Asiatics?”
At first glance, this seems a reasonable complaint. The New Hebrides —especially the southern islands, like Tanna, Anei tyum and Erromanga—are among the best islands of the South Pacific—fertile, well-watered, beautiful and reasonably cool, and they are capable of much agri cultural development.
But they are hopelessly handicapped by two things—the administrative paralysis of the Condominium Government, which has no thought or intention of immigra tion and settlement; and the slow and in efficient Joint Land Court. The duty of examining land claims and issuing titles was delegated to the latter Condominium authority 40 or 50 years ago, and not a tithe of the land claims have been dealt with. They are not likely to be dealt with while the Condominium system persists.
It is true that large areas in these at
tractive islands are held by big commer cial interests; but, in the majority of cases, their titles to the lands are aues tionable, and subject to confirmation by the Land Court. The present titles are so unstable that the present holders, for the most part, are not able to contem plate the subdivision and sale of virgin lands, , , .
T>EING so near to the big and growing -U markets represented by Australia, it must seem strange to the casual ob
"the'are"n£“browht ?o
p?|dSn; but There fs httle chance ot -anything being done while Britain and Prance sit gri B m]y on either side 0 f the Condominium barrier, and jealously watch each other Plain commonsense would say that the JYj* o^o group- with the British Solomons m foi good measure—should
Sq S St
the Bismarck Archf- Sro But n?ain commonsense seems t S r °\ 0 enterinto matters nevei t 0 entci into these matteis.
Nearly fifty years ago, the late Sir James Burns handed over to the Austra lian Federal Government all his rights and title to about 100,000 acres of New Hebrides lands, in the confident belief that Australia would settle and develop
those valuable areas. Unfortunately, most of Sir James’s titles were titles ac quired in the lively but ungoverned trad ing days in the New Hebrides, between
1880 and 1900, and were subject to Con firmation by the Land Court. To-day, nearly 50 years later, the Land Court is still contemplating the colossal task of examining and checking the titles. Aus tralia, for 30 years, maintained a solicitor in Vila, to advance her claims before the Land Court; but, since the war, Canberra appears to have lost heart, and has no legal representative in Vila now.