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The lands in question are, to quote the Oakley award,
"vested in the Army Council in fee simple in possession or
for an estate or interest deemed for the purposes of these presents to be the equivalent. " luch of the area was acquired by purchase, but for practical purposes the conditions of tenure of the land so acquired and that originally lent to the War Department for military purposes are the same. The land which it is at present proposed to make available for the building of new barracks is either Crown land of no present commercial value or village land, of which the cost of resumption will be small, and in any case will be included in the total Colonial Government expenditure mentioned above.
Owing to differences in the precise areas involved, it is not possible to say exactly what value was placed on the lands now in question by Sir John Oakley, but the figure would be substantially greater than $10,000,000.
If this were dealt
with in the Military Lands Account, the Colonial Government might be called upon to pay the whole of that sum towards reprovisioning on such scale as the Military Authorities might choose to demand, and if the whole of that sum were not required to be expended immediately the balance would remain as a liability. Instead, the Military Authorities have agreed to consider the matter entirely outside the Military Lands Account and to accept a maximum contribution from the Colonial Government based on the estimated cost of reprovisioning, subject in any case to the cost to the Colonial Government not Actual estimates exceeding the actual cost of reprovisioning. of the cost have not been prepared but it is thought that they would not amount to more than $5,000,000.
5.
The Colonial Government will thus provide a sum in cash which at the most will be no greater than would be called for under the alternative suggested and will avoid the
incurring of a new liability.
A further advantage of the
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