This Act may be cited as the Native Trustee Amendment Act, 1924, and shall be read together with and deemed part of the Native Trustee Act, 1920 (hereinafter referred to as the principal Act).

Where the Native Trustee is executor or administrator, or is by law authorized to administer the estate of any deceased person, or to act under section four of the Native Trustee Amendment Act, 1922, a certificate under his hand and sealed with his corporate seal, certifying that he has taken out probate or letters of administration or is authorized to administer or act as aforesaid, and stating the date when such probate or letters of administration were granted or when and how he became authorized to administer or act, and the name, residence, and description of the deceased person or person under disability, shall for all purposes be sufficient evidence of such death or disability, and of the appointment of the Native Trustee, and of his authority to administer or act pursuant to such appointment.

In respect of the estate of a deceased Native such certificate shall be sufficient for the purpose of registering the Native Trustee as proprietor of any estate or interest in any land under the Land Transfer Act, 1915, or of any shares, stock, or other property; and if any land is subject to the provisions of the Deeds Registration Act, 1908, such certificate may be registered against such land as in the case of probate or letters of administration, and shall have the same force and effect, and shall be equivalent for registration purposes to the probate or order to administer with will annexed, and it shall not be necessary to register the probate, order, or will.

The provisions of sections seventy-two, seventy-three, seventy-four, and seventy-five of the Native Land Amendment Act, 1913, shall not apply to any Native reserve administered by the Native Trustee and leased by him under any Act, and such provisions shall be deemed never to have had any application to any such Native reserve.

Notwithstanding anything to the contrary in any Act relating to Native reserves, or to the Westland and Nelson Native Reserves, or to the West Coast Settlement Reserves, the Native Trustee, on being satisfied that any land being a Native reserve or portion of a Native reserve within the meaning of the principal Act cannot be leased or otherwise utilized by him to the advantage of the beneficial owners thereof, may, with the consent in writing of the Native Minister, either sell the said land by public auction or private contract and pay the purchase-money to the beneficial owners of the said land, or may apply to the Native Land Court for a vesting-order in respect of the said land, to be made under section one hundred and twenty-six of the Native Land Amendment Act, 1913, and the provisions of that section shall thereupon apply to such land accordingly as if the circumstances constituted a termination of the trust affecting the said land.

The Native Trustee is hereby authorized to take any submortgage, assignment of rent or purchase-money, chattel security, promissory note, or bill of exchange, whether by way of collateral security for moneys invested or to be invested by him in any of the classes of security enumerated in section twenty-one of the principal Act, and interest on such moneys, or by way of security for further advances and interest thereon, and may exercise all the powers, authorities, and remedies conferred thereby on the grantee, mortgagee, submortgagee, payee, or other person entitled to repayment, as the case may be.

With respect to the annual rents and proceeds of lands in the provincial districts of Wellington and Nelson known as “the New Zealand Company’s Reserved Tenths” (being lands referred to in the First Schedule to the Native Reserves Act Amendment Act, 1896) accruing after the thirty-first day of March, nineteen hundred and twenty-five, the following provisions shall apply:—

The Native Trustee is hereby empowered to expend any moneys forming part of the accumulations of the residue of the annual rents and proceeds already accrued in respect of the said lands, or that may hereafter accrue, for completion of the titles of the said lands, or for bringing the same under the provisions of the Land Transfer Act, 1915, or for surveys necessary therefor, or for such other purposes as the Native Minister, on the recommendation of the Native Trustee, may approve.

If and whenever the Native Trustee shall deem it expedient for the better administration of any land, the fee-simple or control whereof has been vested in him by any Act, to acquire other land required in connection therewith, either for the purposes of a road or for any other purpose, he may acquire the same by purchase out of the revenues of the land so vested in or controlled by him, or he may exchange any part of the land vested in or controlled by him for the land so required, with or without payment out of the aforesaid revenues by way of equality of exchange.

The Native Trustee may dedicate the land so acquired, or any part of the land so vested in or controlled by him, for the purpose of a public road.

Where for the time being there is no revenue as aforesaid, or such revenue is insufficient, the Native Trustee may advance moneys out of the Common Fund of the Native Trust Office to pay the cost and expenses of acquiring any land as aforesaid, or of laying out or dedicating any portion as a public road, and all such advances, together with interest thereon at the current rate charged by the Native Trustee on advances, shall be a charge in favour of the Native Trustee upon the land affected, and may be recoverable accordingly.

Nothing in the principal Act or any other Act shall prevent or invalidate any assignment, charge, or other disposition (whether made before or after the passing of this Act) in favour of the Native Trustee, whether by way of anticipation or otherwise, of any rent, purchase-money, or compensation or other money which is or may become receivable in respect of any interest, legal or equitable, in any Native reserve or other Native land, or in respect of any alienation thereof.

This section is in substitution for section five of the Native Trustee Amendment Act, 1922, and that section is hereby accordingly repealed.

Section twelve of the Native Trustee Amendment Act, 1921–22, is hereby amended by omitting from subsection one the words “six per centum per annum,” and substituting the words “the rate chargeable by the Native Trustee on loans granted, at the date of the advance, on the security of a first mortgage of Native land.”

Every advance made by the Native Trustee pursuant to the said section twelve shall, with the interest thereon, be charged on the real and personal property in the estate or on the rental or other income of the reserve in respect of which the advance is made.

In respect of any advance so made in respect of any Native estate the Native Trustee may sign and seal a memorial of charge against the estate in respect of which the charge is made. The said memorial of charge in so far as it relates to land may be registered by the District Land Registrar or Registrar of Deeds, as the case may require, and when so registered shall have the same force and effect as if it were a valid mortgage to the Native Trustee executed by the Native owner of all the lands therein described or referred to, to secure the repayment of the principal and interest moneys thereby expressed to be due; and the power of sale and all other powers expressed by the Property Law Act, 1908, or the Land Transfer Act, 1915, as the case may be, shall be implied in the memorial, and shall have the same effect and operation as if the same were a mortgage executed as aforesaid containing the said powers.

The principal moneys secured under any such memorial of charge shall be due on a date to be named therein, and interest thereon shall be payable half-yearly on days to be specified therein.