SETTLING THE SOLDIER

Auckland Star, Volume LXXIV, Issue 198, 21 August 1943, Page 4

SETTLING THE SOLDIER

WITHIN a few days- of tits presentation to Parliament -the« Servicemen's Settlement and Land Sales Bill has been forced through the House of Representatives and on to the Statute Book. Minor amendments have been made in the Committee stages rto meet some of the objections, but for all practical purposes the bill'is unchanged, and with a two to one majority on every division the Government has hammered it through without giving , the country generally adequate time for consideration of the main principles of the bill or for the planning and perfecting of alternatives. Full investigation might have-evolved a plan to cope with the needs of every land-seeking. soldier -without imposing a complicated system which will bring vexatious delays because of the manner in which every transaction TviU/ have to be reviewed in the light of the

productive value of "the land,; the-suitability of the buyer, the suitability - of the land for his purposes, the terms of sale, comparisons with prices previously paid, and so on. Not only soldiers, but also all others who want to buy or sell land will probably find the conditions so difficult and unpalatable that dealings-in.property will stagnate. It is curious that such desperate haste should have been shown to get this bill through the House-before ..the election, when so little is being done for other servicemen who desire and deserve assistance in rehabilitation. In some cases assistance has been refused because the soldier wishes to enter into a business in which the number of licenses is already regarded as sufficient. Nothing done , " to reopen such avenues, little worth recording to cope with the needs of the thousands of men who will not want to go on the land -in any circumstances. These are still left up in the air, dissatisfied* and doubtful. There is no chance " of their needs being attended to before' rises, perhaps because they are spread so wide that they make- no such spectacular election appeal as does a land-settlement plan, s hastily put together.