CO885-(1-2) — Page 639

PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE

Reference :-

C.O.885

ALLY WITHOUT PERMISSION OF THE

BE REPRODUCED PHOTOGRAPHIC- COPYRIGHT PHOTOGRAPH-NOT TO

2 PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE, LONDON

No. 116.

Sir,

Downing Street, July 27, 1850.

IN my despatch on the general subject of the finances of Van Diemen's Land, I have thought it right to reserve for separate consideration the general principles by which the application of the Land Fund is to be governed. The question is one of so much importance that I am anxious that my views upon it should be thoroughly understood. I will accordingly pro- ceed now to explain them. The money derived from sales of land I regard not as constituting a part of the revenue of the colony, in the proper sense of the word, since these receipts do not periodically recur, but arise from the permanent alienation of part of the public pro- perty, and ought therefore to be dealt with as capital to be invested in the accomplishment of objects of permanent public benefit. The proper object also of disposing of land by sale instead of by free grant, according to my view of the subject, is that of regulating the distribution of the Crown Lands among those who will turn them to the best account, not that of realizing a large sum of money for general purposes. Experience has demonstrated that when a colony is in the pro- gress of settlement, if land is disposed of either by free grants or by sales at a low price, no precau- tions can prevent its being engrossed by person who acquire possession of it, not with a view to its occupation and improvement, but on the specu- lation of deriving a profit from its increase in value as the colony advances in wealth and population. In the meantime, land thus left

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fund, the debts of the colony, the power of revising the Customs duties, and the distribution of the money appropriated to religious purposes. On the two first of these points you have received instructions in my despatch No. 130, of the 4th of August last. As to the third, it is proposed in the Bill now before Parliament, for establishing the Constitution, to invest the Legislature with full power to deal with the tariff as it may think proper, provided only that it imposes no discriminating duties. With respect to the last, considering the peculiar and exceptional condition of so large a part of the population of Van Diemen's Land, composed of convicts, or of those who have only recently acquired the full rights of freedom, Her Majesty's Government have felt extremely unwilling to take any step which might tend to diminish the security that a certain portion of the revenue should be per- manently appropriated to religious purposes. They have therefore estimated, with as much accuracy as was possible for them, the sums now annually ex- pended in the colony on this object, taking parti- cular care to guard against excess, and have placed the total on the Civil List. If any mistake of amount should have been committed in this appro- priation (which I do not suppose) the Bill itself provides the means of rectifying it by legislation in the colony, subject to Her Majesty's confirmation.

I am, &c.

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Sir Wm. Denison, &c. &c. &c.

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