HAWKE'S BAY PLAN FIVE ACRE ALLOTMENTS

Manawatu Times, Volume LIV, Issue 7019, 19 September 1929, Page 8

HAWKE'S BAY PLAN FIVE ACRE ALLOTMENTS

WORKERS’ INSURANCE.

Per Press Association,

HASTINGS, Sept. 17

A Chamber of Commerce sub-com-mittee, appointed to investigate conditions of unemployment, submitted a report containing the following recommendations. The adoption of a Dominion insuranco scheme upon an actuarial basis, devoid of tho stigma of the dole and that the Government should acquire good land in the vicinity of centres of population that can be subdivided into five-acre or ten-acre lots witb aid to finance necessary improvements, so that workers whoso employment is seasonal or intermittent may have the first opportunity augmenting their earnings by working such lots. Attached to the report was a tentative draft, of a settlement plan, suggesting that the Government should purchase areas of first-class land to be subdivided into garden village areas, consisting of five-acre or tenacre lots. The scheme would be worked on a community and co-operative basis under the supervision of a paid committee of selection and contiol. There would be communal cultivation and labour and group marketing. The following estimate of tho first cost of a five-acre block was given. Five acres at £IOO, £500; house, £750; sheds, fencing etc., £IOO, stock, plants, trees, seeds, manures, implements, etc. £100; contingencies, £SO; total, £ISOO. Repayment of principal and interest Government mortgage) at six per cent., insurance rates etc., would tako £2 a week. It was suggested that all holders be insured against accident and death, speculation prohibited and sales only allowed under certain conditions. The full text of the report and recommenclations are to be scut to the Government.