MR CHAMBERLAIN ON DELICATE GROUND.

Press, Volume LIII, Issue 9303, 2 January 1896, Page 4

MR CHAMBERLAIN ON DELICATE GROUND.

Mr. Chamberlain is evidently anxious to be a good Secretary of State for the Colonies. He realises the importance of his office, And. has begun his administration well. But he has got on dangerous .ground .in suggesting that the ■' Northern Territory " should be handed over to a Chartered Company. The Territory comprises more than half a million square miles, and was provisionally annexed to South Australia in 1863. It has proved itself to be a white elephant td that colony, having made but, little progress, and having entailed a serious annual expenditure over and above tho revenue. The present: European, population is about 1700, to which nearly 5000 Asiatics', chie£y-'" Chinese, may be added. Now there are two things upon which colonists are extremely sensitive : A,n encroachment upon representative institutions and an influx of Asiatics.

Both these tender spots are touched by Mr. Chamberlain's proposal. A Territory in the hands of a Chartered Company is a stage behind a Crown colony, and the Australians were recently very impatient of such a colony on their Continent. When the handful of people in VVestcrn Australia demanded representative institutions and the handing over to them of a territory ten times as large as New, Zealand, the other colonies strongly supported the claim. The spirit which has jealously shorn the representatives of the Crown of all real authority, and which even demands a voice in the selection of Governors, will not endure tho assertion of Imperial authority over a vast area of Australian soil, especially when that authority proposes to treat the soil as a private estate. The other tender point is the dread of am influx of Asiatics. They reason that, if ultra-democratic South Australia'has not been able to prevent the whites being outnumbered by three to' one in the Territory, the Company would certainly not be more successful. It would set out with the intention of making its vast estate pay. It would have no muchrenduring white population 2000 miles away whom it could tax to support a white elephant. It would have no pet theories to make good at any cost. It Would take -the plain, unvarnished fact that white men have shunned tho country, and that it is entirely unsuited for them except as masters. It would argue that it would be much better for the rest of Australia to have this tropical territory peopled and utilised in some fashion than to have it practically vacant arid a cause of jgerious loss. Hence, no doubt, the Company, if set up, would introduce coolies or some tropical race to carry on tropical pursuits. ,We have no doubt, neither has anyone reasonably acquainted with the subject, that this must be, under any circumstances, the ultimate destiny of North Australia; for no human power can remove it into the temperate zone, or enable Europeans to work in it where it is. StiU, we dk> not favour the proposed Chartered Company. The Territory had better, remain as it is till Australian federation is accomplished, and then fall under the joint control of the United Colonies. .These will then be able to administer it according to Australian ideas and instincts. They will make what experiments they please, squander what treasure they think fit, and ultimately accept the inevitable without soreness and wrath against the Mother Country.