At the end of these two years, subject to the
approval of the Director of the Settlement, the settler can take a 999
years' lease of his holding, the Army for obvious reasons retaining
the freehold. After the first year of this lease, the rental payable
for forty years is to be 5 per cent per annum upon the capital
invested in the settlement of the man and his family upon the holding,
which rent is to include the cost of the house, land, and
improvements, and all moneys advanced to him during his period of
probation.
It is estimated that this capital sum will average L520 per holding,
so that the tenant's annual rent for forty years will be L26, after
which he will have nothing more to pay save a nominal rent, and the
remainder of the lease will be the property of himself, or rather, of
his descendants. This property, I presume, will be saleable.
So, putting aside all legal technicalities and complications, it comes
to this: the tenant is started for two years after which he pays about
L4 a year rent per acre for the next forty years, and thereby
virtually purchases his holding.
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