EMPTY DOMINIONS.

Auckland Star, Volume LVI, Issue 84, 9 April 1925, Page 5

EMPTY DOMINIONS.

PEOPLE FOR BIG PLACES.

GOVERNMENT AGREEMENT.

(By Cable.—Press Association.— Copyright.) (Rproived 2 p.m.) LONDON, April S. The Overseas Settlement Committee points out that the agreement which Mr. W. Ormsby-Gore and Sir Joseph Cook signed to-day is really a bitr moneyfinding machine. Its outstanding features are its applicability to every part of the Commonwealth. The insistence that. no approval schemes under the agreement shall require migrants to possess capital should be noted.

The money available is applicable not only for land settlement but all forms of rural development, such as hydroelectric, water conservation, the provision of butter and sugar beet factories and other rural industries. The committee emphasises that "vVestralia. Xew South Wales and Victoria, if they prefer it. arc entirely free to continue tinder their previous agreements, but it is hoped they are most likely to bring the" existing schemes under the new agreement, which it is belived, is financially more favourable than earlier agreements. Tn the event of the latter choice the conditions under some of the existing schemes will probably require modification, especially in the direction of not insisting that migrants must possess capital. All are agreed the undertakings under this agreement will require the consent of all the Governments concerned. The committee is devising machinery by which the schemes under the agreement could be most rapidly approved. The various States should now be better able to arrange schemes, for they now know where they stand and the exact amount of money obtainable. The Imperial Government's contribution for the next decade in the shape of interest is estimated to aggregate £7,083,000, which is exclusive of passage. The agreement is expected to be signed shortly.—(A. and N.Z. Cable.) TERMS OF AGREEMENT. THE AUSTRALIAN VIEW. (Received 1.30 p.m.) SYDNEY, this day. The terms of the new migration agreement just concluded between the British Government and the Commonwealth have ■been announced by Mr. S. M. Bruce (Prime Minister). The agreement provides for a sum of £20,000,000 being made available to the Australian States at an interest of 2 per cent for the first five years and 2£ per cent for the second five." This amount will be increased to £34.000,000 if three States (New South Wales, Victoria, and West Australia) decide to merge their existing land settlement agreements into the new agreement, which is entered into. The British Government is providing interest on the amount so advanced to the States to the extent of ono-half for the first five years and one-third for the succeeding five, the balance of the concession to the States being provided by the Commonwealth. — (A. and N.Z.)