MAORI GIRLS AND CHINESE

Taranaki Daily News, 13 July 1929, Page 15

MAORI GIRLS AND CHINESE

EMPLOYMENT IN GARDENS AKARANA ASSOCIATION PROTEST ALLEGED CANVASS OF DISTRICT. (By Wire—Special to News.) Auckland, Last Night. That canvassing was being carried out in tho Auckland province for young Maori women to accept employment in Chinese market gardens was tho remarkable statement made at a meeting of the Te Akarana Maori Association today. A report was made to the meeting on tho results of some of the inquiries made by the association in its efforts to eliminate tho Asiatic menace. Reporting on the inquiries made Mr. George Graham, the president, said that in Asiatic cultivations near Auckland at the present time at least-54 young Maori women were living in Chinese quarters. “In tho past 12 months we have had brought before our notice 11 definite cases of unfortunate results where our young native women have consorted with Chinese,” Mr. Graham went on. Concern was felt by the investigators in discovery that agents appeared to be visiting Maori homes in the country districts and trying to induce young women to obtain employment with the Chinese.

It was pointed out that the drift of young native women into such employment was due to some extent to economic pressure, but there was now a sinister aspect in the efforts to induce young women to leave their home settlements.

Supporting tho representations it has already made to the Government on the problem, the association decided that the only remedy was complete prohibition of Asiatics as immigrants to New Zealand and a policy tending to eliminate tho Asiatic as an element in the Dominion’s population.