IMMIGRATION—AND LAND

New Zealand Times, Volume XXXVII, Issue 8330, 16 January 1913, Page 3

IMMIGRATION—AND LAND

To the Editor “ N.Z. Times.”

Sir, X riotico that the Government "intends to pursue an active immigration policy." Mr Massey says so. This country should bo gaining at least twenty-five thousand people a year by immigration. Again, Mr Massey says so. Consequently. this matter has been detached from the Ministry of bands and given the aitrmty aiui importance of a separate do* partmeut. Mr Cell, Minister of Internal Affair*, in to have charge of the Immigration Department, with the assistance of an Under-Secretary specially appointed. Mr Bell was said not long ago to have “made a special study'* of the question of immigration, though in what particular directions these studies have been directed, and to what special conclusions they have led, the people who are concerned are not allowed to know. Incidentally, it may be mentioned, this sorb of thing is handed out as “Reform/* Now, sir, I am very much afraid this immigration scheme contains the germs of serious trouble. Perhaps that is why immediate responsibility is to bo cast upon, the only member of the Cabinet who can find in the comparative seclusion of the Legislative Council some degree of shelter from the inevitable bombardment of inconvenient questions in Parliament. Not that New Zealand does not want population, which can bo eoctired by importation. She does. Phis Dominion is very sparsely peopled. The whole of her population could easily be carried in a single one or her smaller provinces, if . If the land were unlocked New Zealand could welcome shiploads of immigrants with every confidence and goodwill. They could be met at the wharves with open arms and warm hearts. But while the existing land monopolisation continues, while the amount of money collected by way of land tax is so light that the payers meet the demands with a smile and continue to make the public stand off the grass, the encouragement of people in appreciable number to come to New Zealand to “settle** is nothing but a delusion and a snare. Mr Massey is in office with, the special purpose of perpetuating land monopoly. He was assisted to the Treasury benches through the influence and capital of the groat landowners. Despite all his protestations and those of associates about close settlement, and notwithstanding the famous graduated land tax and new valuation fakes of last session, Mr Massey is the head of a political coterie whoso chief design is to buttress the squatter. In other words, to keep the peoplo off the laud. And he professes to believe we should increase Hie population by immigration to the tune of twenty-five thousand a year-—-that every four years there should be added one hundred thousand persons to the already great multitude of landless people in New Zealand. The proposition is worse than absurd. It would be amazing if one did not remember that it is ‘Tieform. —I am, etc*, VIGILANT. Wellington, January 15th, 1913.