LAND SETTLEMENT.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LIII, Issue 16215, 28 April 1916, Page 4

LAND SETTLEMENT.

The Prime Minister is thoroughly sound upon the general principle that well-organised land settlement offers a solution to the problem of employment which must be faced at the conclusion of the war. As a necessary consequence of the withdrawal of many thousands of men from the industrial life of the Dominion, our industries have been contracted. With the return of our men the effect of this contraction upon the labour market must become visible, for however quickly the more elastic industries regain their normal level it is obviously impossible to restore unaltered the entire industrial machinery after prolonged contraction and dislocation. Fortunately for New Zealand, there is abundance of land for settlement. The general processes of settlement can absorb readily an indefinite number of men, while every settler placed on the land affords constant and permanent employment for others. There is positively no danger of any surplus of labour if energetic steps are taken to prepare for the settlement of those great

unoccupied regions which wait for the husbandman.; while the financial burden that is so rapidly increasing will be borne with ease as increasing productivity sustains a greater population and swells the volume .0! exports. We would again point out to Mr. Massey that a' fundamental condition of successful land settlement is the construction of trunk railways through the districts to be settled. The North Island Main Trunk, although handicapped by the embargo on Native Lands, was an object lesson in tho effect of railway construction on land settlement. The East Coast railway would open up an even greater area, and is essential to the effective settlement of that great region. This should be seriously taken in hand by the Government, so that the return of peace may find the Dominion prepared to take full advantage of its opportunity. A few thousand soldier-settlers would be easily obtained and their establishment on the land would be as advantageous to the community as to themselves—but this establishment calls for a railway which cannot bo built in a day and is nevertheless tho key of the situation.