IDLE LANDS.

Dominion, Volume 2, Issue 539, 21 June 1909, Page 11

IDLE LANDS.

THE QUESTION OF NATIVE OWNERSHIP. , VIEWS OF A CANADIAN FARMER. "Tho best polioy, and tho only land policy \ for your Dominion Government, is to open up the areas now lying idle, 1 ' said Mr. W. Carew, a Canadian farmer, who has como to Now Zealand to take up land, speaking to I Thp Dominion'B| Auckland representative "Relatives ha\e induced mo to come here, tnd I havo spent several months looking round for a plaeo to suit mo. "No, I am not going back to Canada," ho continued. "I like this country, and I seo possibilities in it for up-to-date farming "Why,"" he said, "look at tho millions of acres you havo hare looked up undor an absurd sj stem,of Native ownership What a screaming farco anj policy is winch seoks i to do other than open up land when farmers wo willing to go on it. It's just tho same as if I put all my seed oats and whoat m a granary and kopt them there year after year refusing to.sow I might want them at some future time. That any Government m the world could seriously do what tho Now Zealand Government is doing positively, staggers me, and that tho peoplo of I a country should allow a Government to do it staggers mo some more Then your Labour Department solemnly announces that building is slack, that engineering trades aro slack, tnat clothing tiades are slack, and that thero is no demand for farm labour Of course thoj're stack! What else could they bo but slack if you don't open up yonr lands? The slackness of these trades points to ,ono obvious conclusion—never mind about your temporary depression and all that-the conclusion your cities and your artisan classes, havo been steadily growing and growing and land settlement hasn't been keeping pace, and so you reach the stage when the ' check strings automatically pull you up. The farmer works for all, and he is ready to work for all, and you won't lot him: yet they call this a'country of advanced legislation." When the question of form of tenure was raised, Mr. Carew replied that nothing else ■ than tho freehold would suit him, and ho had tho cash to purchase with, and had two or three places in view. The optional system to enable tho man without capital to ultimately own his farm was tho best system in the world, and he wouldn't take a Native lease nnless ho got it for nothing. Ho hoped tho good sense of tho peoplo would come to tho rescue and forbid any system of Native landlordry, '' "Much as I admire tho- Maoris," ho said, I'd sooner leave a country than bo a tenant of a native Hero you have a magnificent opportunity of -making tho North Island a thickly-populated territory, with a great busy farming oommunity pouring wealth into your cities and your Government coffers, increasing jour oxports tenfold, employing all rour artisans and many more, crowding a ousy, traffic on to your railroads, attracting' a greater fleet of mercantile shipping to your wonderful harbour, exporting twenty times tho present output of butter and frozen tieat—ancj yot tho Government lets the golden opportunitv pass it by I have been down at Kawhia. What a wonderful trado gateway that harbour might bel It could bo one of the centres of the Dominion, and yet it is given over to silence by reason of the areas of Native land around it. The gum lands aro only poor because they're not used. Dense cultivation under orchard would make the gum areas return some of the richest harvests ever known in your country. How such a monstrous, such a preposterous idea could be held as was voiced by one of tho responsible Ministers of-the Crown on Saturday is beyond comprehension. From pre- , sent appearances I should call it a policy of absolute.stagnation. -I would use stronger trords, but I doubt would print them." The Ministerial description of a freei holder as a "oriminal" was pointed out to Mr. Carew, who replied that a more blazing pioce_ of impudence ho had jnover s heard, .in his life; The doman'd was iFor small holdings, and tho Government could cut the Native and Crown lands'into small - holdings, and it waa the farmer who boro the burden of State. _ The question affected the wholo social and industrial life of the country, and if tho Government of Now Zealand would not / open up the'idle lands, then"it was to the interest of every town worker of whatovor * falling, to the interest of every country worker of whatever calling, to rise up and tlvrow that Government out for one that was oblo to see beyond its own- nose.