Parliamentary Candidates and the Mining Industry.

Auckland Star, Volume XVIII, Issue 202, 30 August 1887, Page 2

Parliamentary Candidates and the Mining Industry.

(To the Editor.) Sib, —Having read most of the speeches of the different candidates who are seeking the suffrages of the electors of Auckland, I find that the mining industry is hardly ever mentioned, and when it is spoken of it is little more than a passing remark—most of the candidates having retrenchment on the brain. The development of the mineral resources of the colony must and will claim a greater amount of attention from the members of Parliament than it has ever done before. The mining industry is almost the only one that will lift us out of our present depressed state. In 1886 the gold exported from Auckland was 32,271 ounces, of the value of £128,140—money actually dug oufc of the ground. Is, then, this an industry to be lost sight of ? At the Thames we have thousands of acres of land only partially prospected, where we have gold and silver in abundance, which is only awaiting the development of a process to extract it from the various ano: complicated ores. As soon as this is forthcoming, the hills will resound with the ring of the pick, hammer, and gad, when all our surplus labour can oe profitably employed, bringing forth the hidden treasures of the eartn, wealth to the people, and happy homes to those employea. Fellow electors, see that your would-be M.H.R.'s pay some

attention to this industry. We are down upon our luck just now, and require a little help and support. This industry will bring prosperity to your merchants, storekeepers, Farmers, and working men sooner and quicker than any other industry possibly can do. Where Will a fanner get a better market for his produce than in a mining district, and yet I see in a speech reported m the papers that one candidate at Pukekohe says he would sweep the Mines Department away. I hope the electors will have the good sense to sweep him into oblivion on polling day. The present Government is the only Government that has done anything for the Thames and mining. It v the only Ministry we may expect anything from. It is a combination Ministry, composed of three Liberals (Stout, Ballance. and Tole), two Conservatives (Vogel and Richardson), and one semi-Conservative (Larnach). VMth two Liberals in the place of Vogel and Richardson, it would be the best Ministry New Zealand ever had. I was a victim ot the Hall-Atkinson retrenchment a tew years ago. when the same howl was going forth for retrenchment. .What did they do ? They turned out all the working men they could from one end of New Zealand to the other. About thirty or more were turned out from the Auckland Railway Workshops, myself amongst the number. Wage - earning married men with families — what were they, the breadwinners of treble their number, to do? Why, live on the storekeepers and dig gum ! Those who could left the countrysome first-class tradesmen that the country could ill-afford to lose. This is the kind of retrenchment electors must expect from a Hall-Atkinson Ministry. They will turn their working men adrift to^ell the ranks of the unemployed, to live on charitable aid, the storekeeper, or to starve ; and after a short time they will fill the vacant billets with men from' tlie South as they did before.—l am, etc., Thames. Verox.