DISAPPOINTED IMMIGRANTS

Otago Daily Times, Issue 18774, 30 January 1923, Page 9

DISAPPOINTED IMMIGRANTS

SERIOUS WARNINGS. (Thom Oub Own Correspondent.) LONDON, December 14. In view of the publicity being given to conditions in Australia and New Zealand owing to Lord Haig’s recent statement in Manchester, two letters apnearing in provincial newspapers last week will probably be of interest. They are both typical o! what has been served up to the public for a very long time, and only bear out the contention that more letters from the majority who have been successful would help to maintain a right perspective regarding the present conditions in the dominions. Here is a letter to the Sheffield Independent : “I am a Sheffielder, bred and born and lived there all my life—4o years—but as things were so bad I left there and came out here (South Australia) early in 1921, but if I had kpoym what the actual conditions of life were I should never have come. I send you a few newspaper cuttings from the Adelaide papers of September, from which you will see the true condition of things here; and which I trust may be the means of preventing other Sheffielders from making life harder for themselves by listening to the false propaganda issued from Australia House* Strand, W.C.2. . . . The taxation of the working classes is unbearable. There are only just over 5,000,000 people here, and the public debt is £832,000,000. The governing classes know their only hope of salvation is to get more people over here to help carry this crushing burden. Many, however, who do come, when they see the awful conditions prevailing, cither return home or go to New Zealand. Do please use your pen to warn the poor boy emigrants. Their lot is hard, and they little know the life they are coming to.” MISERY IN NEW ZEALAND. And this from a returned emigrant writing to the Newcastle Daily Journal; “In the interest of truth, and for the benefit of intending emigrants, I would like to state tnat if there are no Imperial ex-soldiers starving in New Zealand it is because they have displaced New Zealand workmen or are in receipt of charity. I left New Zealand two months ago. I was a member of an Unemployment Committee in one of the cities, and state solemnly that unemployment and charity were in marked existence in the country Further, public subscriptions to alleviate the unemployment and misery were bein'* appealed for in the newspapers, and two clepots at least were established for the distribution of second-hand clothing, meat, etc Land speculation that took place during the war, and the tendency towards inflated land values, have worked havoc with the agricultural and industrial activities of the country, and until land is obtainable in New Zealand at genuine value unemployment must continue.”