AN AWKWARD QUESTION.

Manawatu Standard, Volume XLI, Issue 9608, 6 September 1911, Page 6

AN AWKWARD QUESTION.

"COULD NEVER HAVE SAID SUCH A THING." (Peb Press Association.) WELLINGTON, Sept. 5. Replying to questions in tho House by Messrs Wright and Ruseell, concerning the article in tho Dominion quoting a statement published in London, said to havo been issued by the High Commissioner, to the effect- that there is a general scarcity of labour in the Dominion, and that the domestic servants are as difficult to procure as nuggets of gold, and that the Dominion requires to import apprentices, ploughmen, that capable farm hands are anxious to become settlers, and that wo needed another million of people in tho citiea and two millions on the land, whom we would welcome, and who, if hero tomorrow, would all find amplo work and employment, Sir Joseph Ward said ho had brought the matter of immigration up at the Imperial Conference. Labour exchange and immigration was a very difficult matter to deal with at certain times of the year, and the system of immigration employed by tho High Commissioner was stopped for the timo being, so as not to bring peoplo here during the winter months. Thoy were getting as many peoplo to New Zealand for the purposes named as was necessary. Assisted immigrants for 1910 totalled 2187, and for six months of this year the number was 1105. Tho Government had not changed its. policy concerning immigration, and no instructions had been given to alter the system now obtaining. There must bo some mistake or misapprehension in the statement attributed to the High Commissioner. Sir Wm. Hall-Jones could never have said such a thing.