VPRS 13301 Register of Applications and Decisions, Ballarat, Section 19 Land Act 1869 (District Surveyor)

Full description

Under section 19 of the Land Act 1869 selectors could apply for a three-year licence to occupy Crown land. The rent was set at two shillings per acre and a maximum of 320 acres per selector was allowed. On application, a deposit of half a years rent was paid. If the application was refused, the deposit was refunded. Section 20 of the Act placed conditions on the three-year licence with selectors required to improve their allotment by the erection of fencing and a dwelling, cultivation of their land and the destruction of vermin and noxious weeds. After the licence term had expired, the selector was eligible to apply for a seven-year lease or for a Crown Grant to purchase their allotment. Grants or leases were only approved if improvement conditions had been met. If a selector opted for a seven-year lease, the yearly rent was used to pay off the purchase price of the land. Rent previously paid under Section 19 was credited against the purchase price. Applications could be made at local District Survey offices.

Applications were reviewed by a Local Land Board. The functions of the Local Lands Boards were to investigate and report upon every application, to protect the public and local interests and promote the advantageous occupation of land. Local Lands Boards included in their membership the Surveyor-General, the Assistant Commissioner of Lands and Survey, the Secretary for Mines, chairmen and members of Mining Boards and Shire Councils and were assisted by District Surveyors, other officers of the Department and Mining Surveyors who had made the surveys of the sites applied for. These enquiries were made in district centres and other principal centres of population on and in the vicinity of the goldfields. The decision with respect to the application arrived at by the Local Lands Board was then entered in the Applications Register. As the land was able to be selected prior to survey, it then had to be accurately surveyed prior to a license for occupation being issued.

The volume in this series, created and maintained at Ballarat, records and summarises the process of application, survey and decision-making. The details given of the application are the sequential number allocated in this register, the name and address of the applicant, the section, allotment and subdivision applied for and its area, the parish and the county and the date of its receipt. The details given of the survey process are given under headings of the date of survey receipt, the surveyor's number of application, the dates of the commencement and completion of the survey, the name of the contract surveyor, the dates relating to any returns of the plan for amendment and the District Surveyor's report. Dates are given for the forwarding of the documentation to Melbourne, the decision regarding the application by the Local Land Board and the date upon which the decision was made. When received in Melbourne, the application would have been then registered in the registers in VPRS 12026 Register of Applications, Sections 19 and 20 Land Act 1869.

VPRS 13301/P1 was previously registered as Unit 4 of VPRS 1283/P Applications Registers (All Districts, Land Act 1865).