LORD BLEDISLOE

Greymouth Evening Star, 2 December 1929, Page 5

LORD BLEDISLOE

EXPERT IN FARMING. (By Cable—Press A <*bii— Copyright.) LONDON, November 30. Lord Bledisloe, the. newly-appointed Governor-General of New Zealand, is a fine type of the English country gentleman. He is of medium height, and is athletic in build, being greyhaired and grey-moustached. He is an enthusiastic agricultralist, and he is a large practical farmer, with extensive estates in Gloucestershire and Wiltshire, which areas he farms on the most modern principles/ securing the highest* - wheat averages. He is an expert in the treatment, of grass lands and in the improvement of the breed of live stock, and he is .also a strong supporter* of the principle of, smajl holdings that are worked by a farmer and his family, as opposed to the tenant system. Lord Bledisloe advocates co-opera-tion by the farmers, -not merely in the sale of their produce, but also in the purchase of their raw materials, likewise in transportation and in the use of credit facilities. He considers that the farmers should organise for the control of the wholesale markets, and should regulate the sale of their products. Lord Bledisloe is particularly interested in New Zealand’s dairy produce market system, and he keenly anticipates observing this scheme in actual operation in New Zealand. He had intended to lead the Farmers’’ Delegation which will shortly visit Australia and New Zealand. Lord Bledisloe expects to embark

for New Zealand in January. In an article published in the “Spectator,” Lord Bledisloe said: —The creation of small family farms has become an urgent need for the output of home-grown food and for the production of efficient men and women, well equipped for the task of peopling our overseas Empire. It is indeed the human products of the peasant proprietary system, such as exists in Scandinavia, which have provided Australia, Canada, and New Zealand with a far more experienced and confident type of settler than Britain is able to do, either from her urban unemployed or from the ill equipped denizens of the devitalised countryside, who are operating helplessly under a wornout territorial economic system. LAST MINUTE APPOINTMENT.

LONDON, November 30. Lord Bledisloe, speaking to-night at the dinner of the Gloucester Institute of Bankers, said that he was rather preoccupied, because three days ago the King, on the recommendation of the Government of one of the foremost of the Dominions, had* asked him to undertake the Governor-Generalship of

New Zealand. It was with the deepest regret that he would have to absent himself from the dear old country for five years. He felt most diffident, but he would try to justify His Majesty’s selection, and would do the best in his power as an Englishman and a Gloucestershire man. The only discordant note as to Lord Bledisloe’s appointment was struck by the “Labour Daily Herald,” which asks why the Government should appoint a Tory to the position. It says the Government might as well have followed the precedent which it set in the case of Tasmania, where Governor O’Grady (a Labourite) has acquitted himself

•with distinction. DOMINION MESSAGE. (Per Press Association.) WELLINGTON, November 30. Sir Joseph Ward hast cabled Lord Bledisloe, Governor-General-elect of New Zealand as follows: —“On behalf of the Government and people of the

Dominion, I desire to extend warm congratulations upon your appointment as Governor-General of New Zealand. I beg to assure you that a very cordial welcome awaits Lady Bledisloe and yourself.”