Acquisition of land and compensation in New Zealand

Abstract

Variously termed as 'compulsory purchase' or 'compulsory acquisition' in England, 'eminent domain' or 'condemnation in the United States', 'expropriation' in Canada, 'resumption', 'land acquisition' or 'compulsory acquisition' in India, Singapore, Malaysia, Australia and New Zealand, it is a process whereby the government or its angencies lawfully takes for public development purposes privately owned land or interest in land compulsorily in defiance of the wishes of the owner. Rather than merely regulating and restricting Every restriction upon the use of property imposed in the exercise of the police power deprives the owner of some right theretofore enjoyed, and is in that sense an abridgement by the State of rights in property. But a restrictive or regulatory measure is not a 'taking' of that property unless it is in substance confiscatory: Pennsylvania Coal Co v. Mahon (1922) 260 U.S. 393, 417; Belfast Corpn v. O.D. Cars Ltd (1960) A.C. 490, 519-520. the use to which a land owner may put his land as one would expect to find in planning legislations, acquisition extinguishes the title of the private owner to that piece of land.