CLOSER SETTLEMENT.
How often has it been drammed into our ear's that the "Liberal" Government had solved the problem of land settlement? How frequently have we been told of the thousands of smiling homesteads that are tjie result of .the beneficent legislation of the Continuous Ministry? What, then, are we to think when a good Liberal like Sir John Findlay, an erstwhile Minister of the Crown, pens the follow* injj?.^"It is surely absurd, in view of these facts, to deny that our land system, tested from the point of view of closer settlement, is not an entire and abject failure. The real truth is that the problem of destroying land monopoly has not yet been seriously taken in hand by the State. We have skirted round the evil, denounced it, declared its pernicious influences upon the welfare of our people—and then passed many measures which have been about as effective for the purpose of destruction as a pop-gun against a. man-of-war." As the Christchurch Press tritely asksL' "Which do they prefer that we should believe—that they were.humbugs ; when they were in office, or that "they are humbugs now?"
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Bibliographic details
Wairarapa Age, Volume XXV, Issue 10713, 23 September 1913, Page 4
Word Count
188CLOSER SETTLEMENT. Wairarapa Age, Volume XXV, Issue 10713, 23 September 1913, Page 4
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