Sir John Robertson's Land Act
Note: This Parliamentary debate is preliminary to the passing of the Crown Lands Alienation Bill (1862), enabling free selection before survey and making no reference to Aborigines
Parliamentary Votes and Proceedings; Crown Lands
Alienation Bill and provision for aborigines
(See
Chapter 4)
Mr.
JOHNSON said that “..... the object of legislation was to allow the resources
of a country to develop themselves naturally which they would do unless they
were thwarted by legislation ... country like this (had been) unfettered
by any species of legislation ... His hon. Friend (Mr. Deas Thomson) had told
the House of the immense tracts of country which at this moment were not
put to any use whatsoever. In the settled districts of this country there were
12,700,000 acres of land unalienated from the Crown; in the intermediate
districts there were 13,000,000 acres; and in the unsettled districts there were
123,000,000 acres, making a total of 149,000,000 acres which, under the present
regulations were open to any person who chose to comply with those regulations
... We were in this immense territory, with all these 190,000,000 millions of
acres of land used for nothing whatever .... occupied by a population not
exceeding 30,000 persons .... the regulations with regard to free selection
prohibited (them) from taking land in the vicinity of townships ... He trusted
that the provisions of the Act would ... render the tenure of those holding run
secure ...
The
SECRETARY FOR LANDS said .... that this principle of free selection before
survey, of occupancy, of settlement, and of purchase was provided for in the
land law ... Those who objected to the small settlers picking out the eyes of
the country, had no objection to the squatters doing the same thing. The
squatters enjoyed the right of free selection before survey, and years after the
settlements were made the surveyor went to measure the land ... the Government
had found out at last, that whilst they had the richest pastoral and
agricultural country in the world – a country that was also richer in gold
than any other on the face of the globe – they had yet a population in it many
of whom were actually on the brink of starvation from being cooped up in the
city .... in his opinion, it had been the operation of the present land laws
that had been the primary cause of this destitution ... The hon. Member, Mr
Holden, next complained that the bill contained no provision for the native
blacks. Now, what he would ask, had the question of the alienation and
occupation of Crown Lands, to do with the native blacks? He was quite willing to
do as much as he could for the native blacks, but what was to be done for them
had nothing to do with the settlement of the land question. He would,
however, tell the hon. Member that if provision were to be made for these poor
people, it must be made in kind; it was not to be done by setting land aside for
them for them that they will never occupy. Hon. Members knew full well that this
plan had already been tried, and that even if the land were there for them, they
had no means of making it available, and no capacity for making proper use of
it. If they were to be assisted, it must be done by making a proper provision
for them ... Let them only look at the result would be were he to follow all the
suggestions offered. Some hon. Members were under the impression required to
have provision made for the blacks ... others for immigration and others for the
clergy. If all these were provided for in the bill he need hardly tell them what
its fate would be; and if he desired to see its rejection he need only adopt all
these suggestions that had been
offered
...(&c., &c.)”