THE New Zealand Herald. AND DAILY SOUTHERN CROSS WEDNESDAY, JANUARY, 25, 1911. AUSTRALIAN SETTLEMENT.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XLVIII, Issue 14587, 25 January 1911, Page 6

THE New Zealand Herald. AND DAILY SOUTHERN CROSS WEDNESDAY, JANUARY, 25, 1911. AUSTRALIAN SETTLEMENT.

The New South-- Wales Labour' 'Ministry, holding *' office by the - support of a small body of " Independents," ; finds itself confronted - by. the settlement problems, which are universal in British Dominions, and which no Government can afford, to entirely ignore. We have'the same problems in New Zealand, but here the Government is able to evade a direct answer by taking advantage of the comparative smallness of our territories, , appealing to ..the sentimental disinclination •to disturb the Maori " owners" of vast estates which '' were never - " owned" until British law became supreme, and by scattering a few crumbs of land to be scrambled for by swarms of would-be settlers. In Australia they have vast areas, no ! indigenous -estate-owners, and no experience in the gentle art of making people, who do not want to go on the land, .believe that : they have the best of all possible Governments. '--."Mr.. Neilson, New South Wales Minister for Lands, has therefore to" "do something." He has to conciliate the Labour stalwarts by instituting a leasehold system, to placate the agriculturists by making suitable land easily available, to satisfy the " independents" by encouraging immigration, and, to strengthen the narrow Labour majority by convincing the public that the outcry against j big estates and vast sheep runs was, not inspired solely by envy, hatred, and malice. "Taking ail the circumstances into consideration, it is plain that the Labour Government cannot afford to miss the opportunity of: justifying their existence by initiat- ! ing a vigorous settlement policy, and it -is, instructive to observe - how automatically it is following methods \ recognised as practical and i resultful | in every country but ours. .-

As the Herald has always pointed out, the question of tenure ia secondary to the question of productive, settlement. We favour freehold, because, in our opinion, it is the most satisfactory to the agriculturist, and the most profitable to the State — and we are confident that these advantages will ultimately secure its triumph, whatever limitations maybe imposed to prevent recognised, agrarian evils. But the first thing is settlement, and- apart from - the tenure phase of the matter Mr. Neilson will do good work for New South Wales if he pushes energetically the policy he has outlined at Yass. '■, . He is absolutely sound when he declares for railways preceding settlement. and for studying land-users before' speculators.' One of the blots upontj our North Island; is the long course.! of the Main . Trunk line . through., locked-up Maori Lands, .which arjcd

converting their privileged owners into a hereditary aristocracy at the expense of the State, and to the grievous, detriment of the pakeha agriculturist. Again, all along the East Coast, settlers are struggling with the bush far from lines of communication, while large sums of money are being wasted upon political railways in other parts of the country ; and when an East Coast line is constructed it will largely enrich Maori estate owners unless the Government alters its peculiar Maori policy, arid buys these great estates ahead of construction. We ,do not suppose that Mr. Neilson, •struggling to establish a good reputation, will take the railway policy and the Maori Land policy of this Dominion as his models. Another wise step—contemplated in New South Wales, and repeatedly spoken of though rarely practised in New Zealand— that the preliminary clearing, where necessary, shall be done by the Government. We are accustomed to act upon the assumption that the land settler must always be an axeman. The axeman isa specialist, one of the most expert of tooli workers, and many a man would bo among the best and most successful 'of farmers ■ who could never earn good wages at felling and clearing.,. If New South Wales shows that bush holdings can be made ready for settlement— in "special bush settlements," but as part of the established land policyNew Zealand may be induced to follow an example which is theoretically approved by everybody. Finally, when Mr.. Neilson asserts that " settlement -is the first consideration, revenue from the land a subsidiary factor," he utters a truth which those in New Zealand who profess the same political faith have strangely failed to grasp. .