Mr Rees and His Critics.

Gisborne Standard and Cook County Gazette, Volume II, Issue 191, 4 September 1888, Page 3

Mr Rees and His Critics.

Is an article expressing approval of Mr Bees’ succet ' * England, the N. Z. Herald states As rega.Js Crofter immigration, which is usually associated in the public mind with the establishing of fishing industries, it has been the custom to regard the Southern parts of this colony as especially if not exclusively possessing the qualifications requisite for fishery settlements. The idea may have taken root from the fact of their colder climate bearing more resemblance to that of the island homes of the Scottish crofters who are eking out a precarious living in the far north, partly by fishing and partly from the inhospitable soil. But we fail to see why fishing settlements should not be quite as suitably founded in the North Island of New Zealand, where our waters are known to be swarming with edible fish. It is known that about fifteen or twenty miles north of Gisborne, off the coast of the district operated over by the company represented by Mr Bees, there is a shoal or bank of considerable extent, which, as a fishing ground, probably could not be anywhere surpassed ; while the various bays and inlets of the East Coast are everywhere teeming if ith fish. The establishment of fishing settlements in such a district, adequately supplied with the proper appliances for curing fish could not, with proper management, be otherwise than a success; while the location of such an industry in our provincial district would be hailed with satisfac-

tion by every well-wisher to the country. With respect to the request preferred I to the Imperial Government that they should guarantee a three per cent, loan of a million to assist in colonisation, the project seems so Ambitious as to almost take our breath away. But it is to be recollected that this is exactly on the lines on which these Imperial Colonisation Associations have been moving hitherto at home; for they have been asking npt so much for direct Government expenditure on the object as for its extending assistance to the associations which purpose to raise the funds and carry on the operation of emigration and colonisation, as huge joint stock con. (erns, operating on commercial principles. The opportunity of obtaining land suited for uieir purposes may be an important factor in a scheme for some one or another of such associations being pressed on the Government; and it is probably in connection with one of these associations that Mr Bees’ proposal has been submitted to the Government, suggesting a guarantee on capita! to be raised by the Association. When we consider the force with which public opinion has been advancing st home in faver of an Imperial system for the relief of the congestion of population, the unreasonableness of such a proposal disappears ; and even though the specal district for which Mr Bees is moving in high and influential quarters may not secure all the advantages he anticipates, we should not be surprised if the movements afoot result in a colonising scheme of no ordinary magnitude being directed towards New Zealand.