Migration loss ‘insidious’

Press, 5 August 1981, Page 6

Migration loss ‘insidious’

Parliamentary reporter Unprecedented migration within New Zealand, from south to north, and emigration overseas was one of The most insidious and potentially damaging trends in New Zealand, said the member of Parliament for Lyttelton (Mrs Ann Hercus)' last evening. If the trend was not reversed it would undermine any programme for sound, economic development, she said. “Each week the damning evidence piles up. The preliminary census results, just released, show that for the first time in our statistical history the South Island registers both an absolute and a percentage loss of population."

The figures showed a decrease of about 9000. the equivalent of one small town "wiped off the map," Mrs Hercus said. "But it is actually worse than that. If you take into account that the natural increase in population was about 35.000 in that period, it means that in reality well over 40.000 people have packed up and gone. That is the equivalent of Nelson being wiped off the South Island map." she said. Canterbury lust almost 5000. or 1 per cent. "There is a picture emerging of New Zealand ‘the way it has come to be' under National: drift north, stampede overseas." Mrs Hercus said.