VPRS 14410 Rent Roll, Horsham Land District, Sections 7 and 19 Mallee Lands Act 1896 and Sections 217 and 218 Land Act 1901

All licenses for the occupation of Crown lands and leases of Crown lands required the payment of rent in amounts and at intervals as stated by legislation or regulations made under the authority of legislation. Rents could be paid either by post or personally to the Melbourne office of the Department of Crown Lands and Survey (VA 538) or to local Receivers and Paymasters as designated for each parish and Land District (subsequent to the formation of the Occupation Branch in c 1874). Receivers and Paymasters were often local Clerks of Courts. This series was the Register of Licensees (or Rent Roll) kept to record payments made at Horsham, Dimboola, Nhill or Warracknabeal for Mallee lands in the Horsham Land District.Previous to the passage of the Land Act of 1869, the payment of rents had been recorded in Registers of Licensees and Lessees. These continued for Section 33 of the Land Act 1869 and at the offices of local Receivers and Paymasters. Within the Department of Crown Lands itself and the Occupation Branch these Registers were superseded by the Rent Rolls except for Mallee Lands where the term Register of Lessees or Licensees continued to be used after 1883.Details given in the rent rolls are the name of the licensee or lessee, the details of the location and size of the land, details of the payments of fees and of the date and amount of regular periodic payments of rent. Remarks include details of subsequent purchase of the land, of any transfers of leases or licenses to other holders and the subsequent payments made by those persons, any cancellations or revocations and any instances of abandonment of the land by the occupier.Notifications of rents due at a particular date were circulated by notice or by lists published in the Government Gazette. The latter allowed local officers to be aware of the rents due in their areas. When the rents were paid to these officers, the payments were recorded in the local records and returns forwarded to the Department. Examples of these records may be seen in VPRS 809 Returns of Pastoral Rents Received. At the Occupation Branch, clerks (the rent rollers) were employed whose sole duties were the updating and maintenance of the rent rolls and preparation of certificates documenting payments where these were to be credited against the purchase price of land. Originally from about 1877, a rent roll clerk was attached to each "District Land Office" within the Occupation Branch.Rent rolls, like registers of applications, were arranged according to sections of a specific Land Act. For major provisions such as Sections 19 and 20, Land Act 1869, Section 29 of the Land Act 1898 and Section 35, Land Act 1901, the rent roll recorded only payments relating to that section. Payments for obligations under other sections of the Land Acts could be included together in one roll. Separate rolls were kept for payments made in each Land District and for payments relating to Mallee lands.Section 3 of The Mallee Act 1889 permitted lessees of Mallee allotments to select an area of up to 320 acres out of that allotment as an agricultural allotment. The conditions were to be the same as those pertaining to agricultural allotments in the Land Act 1884. Section 19 of the Mallee Lands Act 1896 continued this provision with the maximum amount of land able to be licensed or leased as an agricultural allotment being 640 acres. The same privilege of selection of an agricultural allotment from Mallee lands was extended to non-Mallee allotment lessees in Section 7 of this same Act, with lessees able to select outside their leased areas. Sections 217 and 218 of the Land Act 1901 continued these rights of selection of agricultural allotments with the amount of land being determined by its classification.