landlord of a rent which was 25 to 30 per cent. higher
than the purchase annuities paid by the neighbouring tenants on the
Dillon estate, which had been bought up by the Congested Districts
Board. Under the Wyndham Act there are in progress reductions of annual
charges, ranging from 10 to 40 per cent., on holdings adjacent to those
where either the landlord is recalcitrant and refuses to sell or where
the slowness of administration has delayed progress and secured no sale,
and, as a result, dissatisfaction reigns among the less fortunate
tenants.

According to the last report of the Estates Commissioners nearly 90,000
holdings had been sold in the period of the application of the Act, from
November 1st, 1903, to March 31st, 1906. The total price of all the
sales agreed upon was nearly forty millions, but the amount advanced by
the Commission was less than ten millions. There is little doubt that
the number of agreements for sale would have been half as many again but
for the lack of money and administrative powers. One of the Estates
Commissioners, in his evidence before the Arterial Drainage Commission,
stated that under the Land Purchase Acts passed before that of 1903 in
twenty-five years 75,000 tenants had purchased at a price of twenty-five
millions, and if to these are added the ninety thousand purchasers under
the Act of Mr. Wyndham the result is seen that nearly a third of the
tenants have in the last quarter of a century become occupying owners.

The immense acceleration in the rate of sale which these figures
indicate, leads one to ask how far the sales under the Wyndham Act have
been as advantageous to the tenants as those concluded under former
statutes. In the first place, it must be noted that more than
four-fifths of the direct sales which have occurred have taken place
under the zones. When the price proposed is above the zones the reason
why inspection is demanded is obviously that the solvency of the
purchaser, with which the State, as creditor, is concerned, is in
question. The minimum limit of the zones was said to be necessary to
protect those with rights superior to those of the landlord, but, as was
observed, the value of land does not depend on the mortgages with which
it is charged. In view of the modern methods by which, on purchase,
there is a Treasury guarantee, inspection before sale tends to reduce
the price, and the absence of inspection under the zones has tended to
enhance prices. It mu