SPECULATION IN LAND

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume LXVI, 13 August 1932, Page 11

SPECULATION IN LAND

A DANGER lord bledisloe utters WARNING “Land as a source of wealth ceases to fructify if it is an object of violent speculation and practicable measures for avoiding the repetition of this a,nti-social process are worthy of the serious consideration of economists and legislators alike,” said the Governor-General, speaking to the Royal Empire Society at Christchurch (reports the “Times”). “A reasonable element of speculation is the very essence of enterprising business,” his Excellency added, “but excessive speculation in the land of a settled country during periods of high prices for its produce is calculated to undermine primary industries, outweigh the economic benefits of agricultural science, and stimulate revolutionary propaganda.” A stable country was one in which husbandry was a profitable occupation, and in which there was no violent fluctuation in land values as the result of the operations of those whose main object was not the winning of wealth from the land, hut a temporary “horizontal’ profit at its expense. Before prosperity returned this problem would have to be tackled resolutely. “As exporters, let us ever bear in mind that if we mean to be sellers of our country’s output to customers overseas, we must also be buyers of their products, whether those countries he situate within the British Empire, or, like China, Japan and Argentina, outside its borders,” he said. “Empire must no longer be a mere sentiment, worthy though that sentiment may be. It must be an inspiration, a motive force generating constructive energy, not only in nations, but in every man, woman, and child belonging to them.”