"MASS PRODUCTION"

Evening Post, Volume CXXVI, Issue 59, 7 September 1938, Page 6

"MASS PRODUCTION"

LAND DEVELOPMENT

CRITICISM AND DEFENCE

Ttfe Government's methods of developing land were criticised by .Mr. H. G. Dickie (National, Patea) when the vote for the Lands and Survey Department was under discussion in the House of Representatives last night. Mass-production methods through the use of unemployed labour could never succeed, said Mr. Dickie. The olji. method of putting the individual on a piece of land had stood the test of time and it would succeed where the j efforts of the j, present Government would fail. Mass production under a 40-hour week was far from being satis-j factory. New Zealand could not have reached its present stage of development if the 40-hour week had been in operation and the land had been turned over, to .unemployed men. The.Minister of Lands, (the Hon. F. Langstohe) replied that he. could give Mr. Dickie.r a number of . instances where land had been brought into production in two years under the Government's methods that could not have become productive in a generation under the system .of individual settlement. Opposition voices: At what cost? The Minister: At. the cost of a lifetime of misery to the individual and a legacy of debt that would never be paid. CAREFUL PLANNING. Mr. Langstqne. added that he would never be guilty, of placing people on land in areas where there were no roads. Settlement of the land would be carefully., planned by the present Government and people would only be asked to take up the land when there was" a reasonable chance that they could make a success of their venture. They, would not be asked to take up land in circumstances that would condemn them to a life of misery and hardship. The Hon. Sir E. A. Ransom (National, Pahiatua) asked what progress had been made with the development of the pakihi land on the West Coast. The Minister of Mines (the Hon. P. C. Webb) said that the Government had carried on with the programme initiated by Sir Alfred when he was Minister of Lands and under Mr. S. G. 'Smith when he was Minister of Labour. Two thousand acres of this class of land were under development, \ and there were-high hopes of a farm being established there. Some of the land was capable of carrying three hundred head of stock and was producing three and a half tons of hay to the acre 7 TheJ indications were that further experiments were warranted. If these could be brought to a successful issue the development of the pakihi land would prove a big factor in. increasing the fertility and prosperity'of the West Coast. Mr. Langstone said he was not prepared !to say a great deal about the pakihi land until the present experiments had been completed and the Government had satisfied itself that its researches had been thorough and all the possibilities tested.