WELLINGTON TOPICS.

Auckland Star, Volume LIX, Issue 305, 26 December 1928, Page 5

WELLINGTON TOPICS.

LAND SETTLEMENT.

% CHRISTMAS TRADE

(By Telegraph.—Own Correspondent.)

WELLINGTON, December 24

The Hon. G. W. Forbes, the new Minister of Lands, has lost no time in preparing for the onerous task that has been thrust upon him by the accession o? the Unitcil party to office. The Prime Minister, knowing his colleague by long personal contact, has decided that Mr. Forbes is capable of bearing both the burdens of the Department of Linda and those of the Department of Agriculture, which had been in the care of separate Ministers during the preceding sixteen years. Mr. Forbes, who eaine into the House just twenty years ago as a supporter of the Ward Government, was one of the first settlers on the Cheviot I'.state. the forerunner of the nine-hundred-and-ninety-ninc years' lease system, and his own personal success has not lessened his faith in the land settlement policies of Mr. Ball.mce and Sir John Mackenzie. He is not eontem- ■ plating the introduction of any -revolutionary policy of his own. His first I step will be to ascertain how the lands of the Dominion stand.

Having had considerable experience during his youth and early manhood in both bii-iness and football, Mr. Forbes may be trusted to go about his investigations with both thoroughness and discretion. His first step, as he announced just before leaving for the South on the eve of the holidays, will be to convene a conference of the Commissioners of Crown Lands of all the land districts in the Dominion and to discuss with these authorities means of bringing about the profitable 'settlement of the available lands remaining in the hands of the Crown. One of the great difficulties he sees before the Land Department is the unsatisfactory coalition of manv of the abandoned farms.

Thanks largely to a delightf;:l change in the weather a few days before the beginning of the great summer festival, the Christmas trade in Wellington has shown a substantial improvement upon that of the corresponding period of last year. A week ago the weather was far from propitious; but two or three days ago it took a turn for the better and since then it lias been all that could be desired by the shop-keepers and the holiday-makers. There are politicians claiming that the improved conditions. I compared with those of last year, are due to the advent of the United Government, but Sir Joseph Ward and his colleagues while enjoying the humour of the suggestion do not claim to have so easily removed the troubles besetting the country they were depicting at the beginning of the month. All that can be claimed by the new Ministry at the present time is that the sun is shining, that the grass is growing, and that the outlook for the future is cheering.