MOTUEKA ELECTORATE

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume LII, Issue 53, 2 March 1918, Page 5

MOTUEKA ELECTORATE

NEEDS OF BACK-BLOCKS SETTLERS.

Mr R. P. Hudson, MJP. for iMotueka, has just returned from a tour of the West Coast portion of his electorate. Since M** Hudson waa returned to the House lie has devoted - a great deal of time in getting into touch with the settlers in all parts of the scattered electorate, and he has become more impressed than ever., with the need, for further opening of the land to enable backblocks settlers to obtain the fruits of their labours and increase production. Mr Hudson is strongly of opinion that curtailment of expenditure in this direction is not only unjust to the settlers, but suicidal from a national point of view. There are men in the bush districts, said . Mr Hudson, this morning, who. have to carry their cream out on horseback in cans held- on the pommel of the saddle. Tf the cans were placed on either side of the horse they would be "knocked off bv the trees. The tracks axe rough and broken, and frequently the horses have to plunge about in mud and slush up to their girths. The men who go back into the undeveloped country and increase New Zealand's productive area are, said Mr Hudson, rendering most valuable service to the Dominion, -and they are not encouraged in the way they should bis. Aa stated above, Mr Hudson's heart has always been with the back-blocker working hard and long amidst innumerable difficulties, but what he has seen recently has made him more determined than ever, as a matter of justice to the settlers and their wives and children, and in the interests of New Zealand as a whole, to urge, with all the power at his command tne pressing need for this development. Mi;> Hudson's efforts in the past have not by any means been in ■vain, but he realises that there is so much woTk to do in the future that he has no time for self-satisfying reflection on what has already been accomplished. At least this •was-'-the impression he gave to an f Evening!"! Mail representative with ■whom he was in conversation to-day.