EMPIRE SETTLEMENT.

Hawera Star, Volume XLVIII, 16 August 1924, Page 5

EMPIRE SETTLEMENT.

EXPENDITURE BY BRITAIN. LAST YEAR’S FIGURES. *T r.ABLB—PBIIS9 ASSOCIATION—COPYRIGHT LONDON, Aug. 14. The report of the select committee of the House of Commons states: “Parliament voted £350,000 for the year ended March, 1923, for expenditure under the Empire Settlement Act, of which the Overseas Settlement Committee spent only £35,000, the balance unexpended reverting to the Treasury.” The Overseas Committee informs "the Australian Press Association that its estimates for all the Dominions comprised : Assisted passages, £200,000; hand settlement. £50,000; child migration, £50,000; training schemes, £so,ooo—total, £350,000. - The Dominion schemes required only £35,000 for assisted passages,, instead of the estimate of £200,000, while the committee was not called upon to spend one penny on the other schemes. Probably, when the accounts were completed for the financial year ended March last, the results would be similar to 1923. , Although the Overseas Committee had ample funds to assist land settlement in the Dominions, the funds were not utilised, perhaps because the Dominions either did not develop their projected schemes o r had financed the schemes themselves. Not a single claim was received for contribution towards settlement except for assisted passages OTTAWA, Aug. 14. The Canadian Government welcomes the investigation which an «overseas settlement party, including Miss Margaret Bondfield, M.P., will make soon in Canada. The Immigration Department has offered to facilitate an inquiry into any phase of Canadian development or conditions of farm labour. The alleged ill-treatment of British boys on farms will probably be under review