CENTRAL OTAGO AND SOUTHLAND.

Auckland Star, Volume XLIV, Issue 33, 7 February 1913, Page 2

CENTRAL OTAGO AND SOUTHLAND.

IMPRESSIONS OF AN AUCKLAND MEMBER. The fertility of the land in many parts of Otago and Southland, even in some districts which we in the North are accustomed to regard as being weatherbitten and barren, and the quality of the farming carried on in the southernmost part of New Zealand, were an eye-opener to the Auckland members who have just returned from the Parliamentary tour to the Central Ott%o and Southland districts.

Mr J. IL Bradney, M.P. for Auckland West, who got back this morning, had some interesting observations to make on the subject. "The trip," he said, "was a magnificent one, including over 1,200 miles of motoring. I suppose we Auckland members travelled in all something like 3,000 miles, and we were treated royally everywhere. The trip through Central Otago was a revelation to the Auckland members. There were stretches of country there lying under a blazing hot sun and showing no sign whatever of vegetation, yet we were told that it was splendid sheep grazing country, and we had proof that it practically turns out the best sheep and fleeces in the Dominion. Where irrigation is gone in for this apparently desert land will grow any crop put into it. As an example of the fertility of this land there are irrigated farms which have been cropped for over 40 years without an ounce of manure." PERFECT ROADS—EXTRAVAGANT RAILWAYS.

"We went right through Central Otago to Lake Wanaka, motoring about 460 miles, and everywhere the roads were such that you could ahnost play WHiards on them. "Their worst roads down there are better than our best, and the country is roaded right through from one end to the other. As to railway expenditure, they are complaining a/bout the lack of it dawn there now, und I quite a#ree in the construction of payable lines, but in the pa-st money must have been expended on raihyay construction lit that end of the colony like pouring out water. In one place there a railway has been put through twenty miles of absolutely barrent country to reach a fertile region, at a cost which, had the money been properly expended on the right routes, would have (built lines in the country that H clamouring for railway communication to-day.

A PLACE OF OLD IDES 11* " Among the things that struck mc down there," said -Mr. Bradney, " was the great number of old identities still to be found as compared with thi North. I came out in a ship that had some 390 passengers, of whom, among the older ones, I don't suppose you could find more than three or four to-day. But down therp, "whether because of the climate or not 1 don't know, it seems the original settlers have lived longer, for everywhere you find old people wiio can talk albout old times. I believe the clinging of the old stock and their descendants to the land they settled on has been a great 'factor in the development of the country in the ~-,. , ii: _. „.-,,,,,-.,. ■ ■ THE SLUICING "DESOLATION. "What Central Otago wants is close settlement. One is struck \rith the wide distances between the houses and the room for closer cultivation. As for Southland, that is the garden of New Zealand. We also visited the sluicing works at Roxburgh, where, with the immense force of the water, rock is cut away like clay, and whole acres, some of them good productive land, are swept into silt every year. I saw one place where a man's orchard was being sluiced away into the river, and he had no remedy against the company, which possesses mining rights over the land. Where the farmer has surface rights, the mining companies buy him out and convert a fruitful farm into boneless desolation. This sort of thing should not be allowed, as the land is the heritage of the people for all time, and nothing should be permitted tg warrant its destruction. WHERE ARE THE RAILWAYS NEEDED? "While agreeing that railways could be constructed down there with profit, I certainly think that the people in the South havf no idea of the difficulties we labour under in the North. 1 myselt pointed out to them the fact, among others, that up here in North Auckland we have but one main trunk railway, about 74 miles in all, running to the North from a city of about 130,000 people, to serve the whole of the settlements north of Auckland. THE DUTY OF THE GOVERNMENT. "I have come to the conclusion that, seeing the people of New Zealand have decided there shall only be State railways in this country—that private enterprise shall not be allowed to enter — it is the bounden duty of the Government to develop the country by railway construction. I certainly believe we shall have to consider the question of borrowing large sums or money to put railways through the whole of the country. The time for the political railway is past, they will have to go in future where they are most needed, and personally I would support a policy of special borrowing for railway construction."'