AUSTRALIAN CONDITIONS.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LIX, Issue 18020, 20 February 1922, Page 8

AUSTRALIAN CONDITIONS.

NEW SOUTH WALES.ELECTION

PROGRESS OF STATE AT ISSUE. ! The future prospects of Australia wero discussed on Saturday by Mr. F. C. McDonnell, who is visiting Auckland after a residence of over 17 years in the Commonwealth. Ho mentioned that during 1921 business conditions were very ba(T and ! after the* visit of the Prince of Wales prices fell considerably. He mentioned that, generally speaking, retail prices were still falling, but the better-class article was remaining firm, the averago Australian always preferring the good article when he had the money to pay for it. Nevertheless, rows of assistants were idle ; in the Sydney shops at Christmas time. I Interest in New South Wales centred on the coming elections, said Mr. Mo : Donnell, who remarked that if the Labour Party went back into power the State would be set back ten years. There was a, hope of better times should the Nationalists provo successful, for in that event a great impetus would bo given to industrial development. The settlement of the Northern Territory of Australia could only be solved by the introduction of black labour, he thought, and he expressed the opinion that Townsville, or even Rockhampton, was far enough north for white labour. There were vast tracts of country in which the white man could not engage in manual labour, and in which if he decided to live a decent life he must havo black labour and servants. Mr. McDonnell was inclined to regnrd the attitudo of the Australians toward this problem a? one of " sour grapes," The bulk of them, he said, would not budge from the cities, and would not allow even black British subjects in to make the north productive. " If they insist on white labour then the cost of the product must be prohibitive to the dwellers in the cities," he added.