THE POPULATION PROBLEM.

Press, Volume LXIV, Issue 13162, 8 July 1908, Page 6

THE POPULATION PROBLEM.

If Mr Millar's remarks to a deputation of waterside workers on the subject of the population problem had no other effect, they have cortainly stimulated public curiosity in tho annual report of the Labour Department, in which the 'Minister promises to give figures that will "simply stagger" us regarding tho decrease in tho number of children of school age in the Dominion. They startled Mr Millar himself, and led him to declaro that it would be impossiblo to maintain our industries without a natural incroaso in the population. The delegates to the Waterside Workers' Conference in Wellington, who had been, discussing tho matter the previous day, apparently recognised fully the danger of the "resent condition of affairs. Tho country, declared an Auckland representative, was not carrying the white population it should, and he forthwith moved: — " That while ful'y recognising the " economic rights of women, this Conference urge upon tho Government " to in every possible way, by a bonus system or otherwise, encourage the " propagation of the white population " in this Dominion." Tho mover remarked that while according to statistics the populations of England and France wore supplying tho industrial needs of each country, New Zealand had only one-twelfth of tho people it required. Tho Socialists among tho deFegates seized the opportunity to air some of their views. Why, asked one of them, should the poor be furnished with an inducement to rear additional members of the slave population? Tho nonsense that an apparently sane man can talk when he gives himself up to a fad is astonishing. The "members of *• the slave population " present did not, however, feel their position so acutely as to follow this lead. A few of them supported an amendment in favour of socialising the means of production, distribution, and exchange, so that tbe family life of tho people might be properly protected and sustained, but the majority appeared to agree with one of the speakers in his remark that the motion was a step forward, while the amendment sought

to grasp tho millennium. In the end tin- motion was carried. It was a plain-spoken discussion, and more than one of the delegates referred to tho pernicious effect on the community of tho teachings of a certain school of thought, as making for moral degeneracy. It was doubtless the deputation's advocacy of a bonus system that drew from Mr Millar the remarks to which we have referred. Tho Minister cannot be said to have given them much satisfaction. He sought, in a rather vague way, to convince them that the Government was alive to tho necessity of doing something, but tho strongest impression conveyed by his speech- is that Ministers aro much perplexed as to their course of action. They admit the need for population, but are obviously chary about instituting a scheme of immigration. Yet the need for something being done in that direction is patent. There is, it is true, a temporary surplus of labour in a few trades that are always more or less affected by the wet weather of the winter months, but for many other workers — capable farm labourers, domestic servants, female factory hands, and so forth—tho demand is as keen as it ever was. Tho problem increases in intensity as timo goes on. The birth rate during tho last year or two has shown a tendency to rise, but it is too early yet to say whether tlie movement is a permanent one, and in any case, though the percentage of births may increase slightly, the individual family shows a steady diminution. The natural increase of population must develop, or population must be brought in from outside, unless Now Zealand is to face tho declino of its industries and the danger of premature decay as a State.