LAND SETTLEMENT

Sun (Auckland), Volume II, Issue 510, 13 November 1928, Page 15

LAND SETTLEMENT

“UNITEDS HAVE DEFINITE SCHEME” MR. MURDOCH AT WHANGAREI (Special to TUB SUKJ WHANGAREI, To-day. In the Town Hall last evening, Mr. A. J. Murdoch, the United candidate for Marsden. addressed a large attendance and was ac< rded a go.nl nearing. The candidate reminded the electors that Sir Joseph Ward's proposal was to borrow £70,000,000, extended over a ten-year period, the money to be utilised tor the special purpose o£ land settlement and development, and the completion of Main Trunk lines. The main difference between the policy of the Reform Party and that of the United Party, he said, was that the United Party's policy aimed at a definite land settlement scheme. Dealing with the unemployment problem. Mr. Murdoch pointed out that the contributory factors leading to the present scale of unemployment were, firstly, the drift from country to towns, and secondly, assisted immigration. In regard to the first factor, he pointed out how 13,000 fewer people were on the land than in 1924, and the Reform candidate had claimed that while there were 13,000 fewer people , they were not farmers, but evidently I people not required on the land on account of the introduction of machin- | ery. It this was so. why had the Reform Party always claimed that it was endeavouring to introduce agricultural immigrants?