SETTLEMENT IN AUSTRALIA

Dominion, Volume 22, Issue 34, 3 November 1928, Page 9

SETTLEMENT IN AUSTRALIA

EVIDENCE OF VISITORS VALUE OF WOMEN’S CO-OPERATION (United Press Association.—By Electric Telegraph.—Copyright.) (Australian Press Association.) f ' London, October 31. Xfr. Leopold Amery, speaking before the Society for the Settlement of .Women, instanced successful settlement under most unfavourable conditions by Australia, notably in West Australia Victoria,/and Queensland. He instanced the optimism of sixty or seventy settlers in the Mallee country after an unprecedented drought. He had never met a more cheerful community similarly conditioned. He was convinced as the result of his tour that women’s co-operation and optimism were men’s greatest asset. Mr. W. Mackinder, M.P. (Labour), declared that the experience of travelling thousands of miles in Australia controverted the English fallacy that Australian settlers’ were necessarily isolated from civilisation. Civic development had reached the world’s highest standard in Australia. “I never saw slums in any city comparable with British, and no rickets in children comparable with British. I never saw a child barefooted, and never saw healthier children, more independent men, and more self-reliant women, notably the wives and daughters of backblocks settlers.”