THE New Zealand Herald AND DAILY SOUTHERN CROSS FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 24, 1909. MARKETS AND SETTLEMENT.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XLVI, Issue 14174, 24 September 1909, Page 4

THE New Zealand Herald AND DAILY SOUTHERN CROSS FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 24, 1909. MARKETS AND SETTLEMENT.

The encouraging rises in the market prices of both wool and butter mean that the agricultural industry has an additional inducement to increase its production and that a further incentive would be offered to land settlement were our locked-up lands made available. An increase of one penny upon the poundage price of wool represents a gain to this Dominion of three-quarters of a million sterling, while every shilling per cwt for butter represents nearly £20,000 more. The stronger and the steadier our London markets become, the greater is the reward offered to the industrious settler, and the greater the output' of wealth-winning - national production. Our internal trade and our industrial prosperity, our public revenues and our commercial activities depend wholly upon the development of the natural resources of the Dominion, of which natural resources the agricultural are the most permanent and 'the most important. It cannot be too insistenly pointed out that Auckland City, as every other city and town in New Zealand, can only provide employment for its workers and trade for its merchants by virtue of the wealth poured into it from the inexhaustible springs of the province at large. It is this wealth which supports our Government and our railways, our workshops and our factories, our wholesale and retail trades, our harbour boards and every other phase of national life. To take full advantage of our national opportunities is therefore a national duty? which the personal interest of every citizen should press urgently upon the Government; and it is in its national duty of settling the land the present . Government has most ignominiously failed. Speaking in Eangitikei, Mr. Fowlds has been asserting that over 500,000 acres have been thrown open annually by the Ward Administration; but he does not tell us how little of this has been" in the v form of small agricultural holdings on O.R.P- conditions. Mountainous areas, where leases have lapsed and been renewed are counted by defenders of the Government in the same category as bush lands into which hardy , settlers go with axe and fire; and by the same ; special pleading the opening of Native' Lands under oppressive shortterm leases, which choke improvement, are held to be the same as the opening of blocks where small settlers may make for their children and their children's children comfortable homes and an assured inheritance. Some little work in the right direction is now being done by the Government in reluctant yielding to the settlement agitation which the Herald has been carrying on for years, and which at last is forcing attention from the lockers-up of waste lands. But instead of a part of the Te Akau Block, the whole of the Te Akau Block should be opened. Instead of a few thousand acres here and there, the immense areas traversed by the Main Trunk, or lying idle in almost equally available districts, should be dealt with. Everything should be subordinated to the most pressing necessity of opening —Crown and Native — while the markets offer such encouragement to settlers. The day may come when prices may fall again—a contingency which can be regarded with equanimity by settlers who have made good use of the fat years to prepare for the lean, but which may well be fatal to new settlement if land is locked up until it no longer offers the golden inducements it does at present.

Instead of taking full advantage of the opportunity afforded by high prices and steady markets to draw settlers to its waste lands from kindred countries, the Government is feebly allowing many disgusted men of the very best class to go away to States where wiser policy prevails. The New South Wales Government is gaining population steadily at our expense, not only from the United Kingdom, but from our own shores, as is shown conclusively by a comparison of the official returns of the two States for the quarter ending June 30 last:—

New South Wales gained (by excess of immigration over emigration) ... 5259 New Zealand lost (by excess of emigration over immigration 3517 And why was this?, This country is the more desirable, its climate the more salubrious, its seasons incomparably more regular, its soil generally more fertile. Yet settlers are forced to leave New Zealand, "/here the land is locked up, and go to New South Wales, where the land is being unlocked with them go artisans and labourers who find no work here because production is being checked at its source. And we are told: " Taihoa." We hear from Ministers long explanations, with wonderful statistics of the areas which have been opened in the mountains of'Otago or placed under Maori Councils, or otherwise dealt with in remote places and obscure ways ; of indignant protests because land seekers persist in refusing the tags and ends of land accumulated during two generations from tie re-

fusals of ancient openings; and flowery promises of what will be, done if we only wait patiently and do not lose our faith in this best of all possible Governments. But meanwhile, population slips away and the land lies idle which would have kept them, while increased taxation threatens because gross maladministration has prevented due increase of population, due increase of production, and due increase in the national revenue. On every side we encounter this "taihoa" folly and its consequences. The Eotorua Times shows one consequence., It says: " The Waiariki Land Board has control of some 400,000 acres of Maori land,, the unimproved value of which it would probably assess at £400,000, and, judging from the high valuations put on the land already offered for lease, probably more.' Incidentally, we would draw the attention of our readers to this instance of the enormous quantities of land held by these Maori Land Boards, and invite comparison with the paltry areas offered by the Government tc Ppkeha settlers under O.R.P. conditions. The Rotorua Times proceeds : " Now if this land were, owned by a European corporation, instead of by a Maori one, it would pay annually £166 13s 4d in land tax, even if the graduated land tax were not applied; and if the graduated tax were collected, it would pay no less than £4000 annually on the excels in value of its land over £200,000 ; and the total tax would be £6000 or £7000." Add to this local rates from which Maori lands are exempt and it follows that " a block of Maori land which contributes nothing to the general or local revenue would, in European possession, pay somewhere . between £8000 and £10,000 annually." Need we inquire further why increased taxation is be■ing considered by the Government. This blocking of settlers from the land, which could be made to produce for favourable markets, and the pernicious attitude of the Government to the Maori land question, is destructive of every public and private interest. This wretched '' taihoa" policy shoidd be swept away. To ensure prosperity, revenue, and employment, the country needs neither explanations, nor promises, but only access to the land, under fair conditions, for,, all bona-fide settlers.