THE UNEMPLOYED AND BACKBLOCK SETTLEMENT.

Auckland Star, Volume XL, Issue 160, 7 July 1909, Page 8

THE UNEMPLOYED AND BACKBLOCK SETTLEMENT.

(To the Editor.) Sir, —In Saturday's "sfcar" you give an interesting account, of some interviews over the question 01 a public meeting for the relief of the present distress through want of work in Auckland. I think the "Star" worthy of all prais<" in the matter. It seems to mc it would be more becoming if the Mayor and councillors were to try to find out the number of unemployed in the city before deciding, as I believe they do, that all is being done that can be done. It is a common saying that if the working men were given the chance to go back the bush on the land they would not go. Truly, I should think not. Anyone who has tried farming in the back-blocks could tell how suicidal it is to do so without cnpital. We will say a man with a family takes up bush land. To begin with he has to borrow money from the bank at about 8 per cent interest. He leaves his wife and family in the nearest township, and pitches his ' tent and fells the bush in the winter. When summer comee he must look out for a good wind and burn it. If it is a wet summer, his bush will not burn, but we will say a fine summer his busb ,"burns fairly well. After that he has to I buy seed to sow it and pay for carting. By the next summer he will have grass and may put young stock on. He may i have to buy very high, and when he ! #omes to sell cattle may have dropped in price, and he loses on them. In about three years' time the logs begin to rot enough to enable him to pile them up and bum them. He will by now have got up a two-roomed house for himself and family. He next makes an arrangement with an auctioneer, and buys cows. Some are failures; some, trees fall on; some get stuck in creeks, etc. Out of 15 cows he may lose five before the winter is out. By this time the bank is pressing him to reduce his overdraft. The local storeman, perhaps some nine miles away, will give him perhaps 6d for his butter, perhaps less. His children get to school occasionally, As they have long distances to walk, regular attendance is out of the question. He hangs out another year, finds he cannot pay the auctioneer or the bank, and sells out, gets enough over the I amount of the overdraft to pay his way, I and drifts into town once more. Probabiy j his wife's health is ruined with hard work, and he himself is older and less able to get -work than ever. This has been a common experience in the past. If land were available on easy terms nearer a town-hip, there is no doubt it would be eagerly seized on. It is only I wealthy people who could live in the i back-blocks, and will they pjo there? ! Mr. Knijrht is reported' as having said ' he was entirely averse to the idea of j a public meeting bein? conrened, as it was for the Charitable Aid Board to relieve distress. At the same time, he admits that their funds would not be equal to the situation if a raid were made upon them. In a report of the Benevolent Society that appeared in the papers last -week, it was said that an appeal to the public would have to be made for funds for their society, otherwise the society would have to turn a deaf ear to appeals for relief. Now, if these societies are both at such a low ebb surely a public subscription fund would be of greit assistance to those in distress. A letter was read at the Benevolent Society, accordin? to the papers, nskin.2 them to consider the question of calling upon the Mayor to call a public mepting, and the Benevolent Society would hare none of it. One is reI luctantly forced to conclude that it is not the distressed people that are uppermost in the minds of these societies, but an .extraordinary jealousy of outside interference.—l am, etc., AX EX-BACK-SLOOKSMAN.