THE WAIRARAPA STANDARD TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 28, 1876.

Wairarapa Standard, Volume 6, Issue 507, 28 November 1876, Page 2

THE WAIRARAPA STANDARD TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 28, 1876.

The question of the sale and settlement of the Waste Lands of a colony ought to prove of more than usual interest to colonists, and should long before this time have received some definite and practical solution. This does not appear to have been the case. In the House of Representatives, last session, there appears to have been almost at many opinions on these subjects as there were members. Primarily, as Mr Sheehan well observed, the chief end and aim should be to obtain settlement of the lands by people who would live upon them and work them. Everything that is done, every step that is taken, that restricts that object is an injury to the country. The free grant system of the Province of Auckland, according to Mr Sheehan, had been eminently successful Under the Waste Lands Act of that Province, he said, very valuable settlements were established ; very good settlers were induced to come into the province, who took up land, settled down upon it, and became a valuable portion of the taxpaying community—men who made two blades of grass grow where only one had grown before, or rather who made many Wades of grass grow where none had grown before. If these men had been called upon to purchase land situated at a distance from the market, and without roads or other means of communication, they would never have taken up the land; but they did so because the law under which they obtained the land enabled them to obtain a Crown grant for it on condition that they settled upon it. Hr Sheehap spoke strongly against the system of immigration which had been established, in favor of special settlements, and against the Government proposal to raise the price of land. He maintained that

“Ha hundred people come into this colony intending to settle and take up land, it would be well even to give them the land - . The country otherwise would be idle and unoccupied, and be a positive loss to the Government who bought it. H the people were living upon the land, they would contribute to the exports and imports of the country and to the local taxation; and although no price was received for the land, yet a return would be received from the occupation of it. At pseaent, every difficulty was thrown in the way of a number of people who desire to form special settlements; and yet three or four gentlemen resident in the colony, who desired to obtain large blocks, experienced no difficulty whatever in getting them at a cheap rate. I consider that to be a blot upon the adssmiitratinn ot the lands of this colony. Oachda people in the colony can obtain the

land, and can have concessions made to thorn, while every obstacle is thrown in the way of people of moderate means who desire to come and settle in the colony.

In reply to Mr Sheehan, Major Atkin* son said:—

“ Had it not been for the initiation of the Public Works scheme, the lauds in the Province of Auckland would have been useless. That scheme has tended to the settlement and opening up of the country, and to the improvement of the land. I consider that we should make a great mistake if we gave away the land, and I am prepared, on behalf of the Government, to take a stand on that, and to say that wo are not in the future prepared to give laud away on such conditions as it has been parted with before. 1 make that statement after a careful consideration of the whole question. If we could be convinced that tiie giving away of land free would produce settlement, we should have no difficulty in consenting to the honorable gentleman’s proposals. But lam quite satisfied in my own mind, and I believe the country is satisfied, that it is impossible, if we gave away the land, not to retard settlement to a very great extent.”

We have our own views on this question which we think are entitled to some consideration ; but we deem it better now to give the opinions expressed by the several speakers on this subject without any comments of our own. The Premier was followed by Mr Hodgkinson, who said;—

“ I desire to express my regret that the Government have not thought it fit to embody in the Bill the principal of giving free grants of land under the homestead system. lam aware that, after what the Premier has said; the idea of getting a vote of the House in favor of such a principle is utterly hopeless, and I shall confine myself to a very few remarks. The Premier, in dealing with this question, showed that he was not acquainted with the history of colonization. So far from the homestead system not being of use in effecting settlement, history proves that no other system has been so effective in colonizing countries. II we go back into ancient times we find that perhaps the most successful colonies of the old world were the Greek settlements in lonia, in Asia Minor. The poorer classes that went out to colonize received land free, while the richer class who remained at home had to pay for any interest they acquired in the land. Then, in the early American colonies the same system was carried out with most beneficial results. Besides, every one but the Premier knows that all the Australian colonies were founded on that principle. In New South Wales and Tasmania, free grants of land were given to the early settlers with very satisfactory results. I can state from my own experience in the Province of Auckland eighteen or twenty years ago that the free-grouts principle worked there on the whole very beneficially, although it was but a very imperfect system. It has been carried out on a most prodigous scale in the North American Continent and I could produce documents to show—l did not know this discussion was coming on, or I would have been prepared with figures—that the President of the United States has stated that no other system ever produced so much settlement in that country. It was stated that in one year some millions of acres were taken up under free grants, and the President went so far as to say that the Government should give up expecting a revenue from the sale of land, and should prefer to give it away in order to secure settlement. In Canada and British Columbia, a system of free grants was carried out, and that was the case in Chili in South America. Yet the Premier told the House that the system was of no use in inducing settlement. I must express my very great regret that a system of giving free grants has not been embodied in the Bill.

Mi Stafford could not agree with the last speaker, of all the systems for selling the Waste Lands that of giving it away was the worst; and to show its pernicious effects he instanced western Australia, Tasmania and New South Wales. He denounced the system which had been in operation at Auckland, and ventured to say that there were not 5 per cent of those who had received land orders who ever settled on the land these orders entitled them to. These orders were bought up in shoals by public-house keepers and other persons in town out of which these so-called settlers never went. He said . I am glad that the question of deferred payments has been made part of the principle of the bill, but I should like to see a stronger administrative power, at least a more defined one, given to the Government for the purpose of determining the districts where the deferred payment system shall be exercised. I am quite certain that if the Government does not take means to secure settlement on such a system that the small proprietors can be put down within convenient distances, so that they can hold tolerably easy communication with each other, and so that the holdings of small farmers shall hitersperse the larger estates, the result will he very disadvantageous to the colony, I knoW a portion of New Zealand where an area of' country 200 miles long is completely shut off from the rest of the colony through being in the hands of large proprietors. In districts such as these, the carpenter, the hW.Varnith, the]|shoemaker,or any other handicraftsman whose presence would be beneficial, is entirely unknown; and I have known instances where a blacksmith has absolutely had to beg, hat in hand, for a bit of land big enough to put a shop on, the Government having parted with their right in every acre of it. Now, if we are going to continue the possibility of that system—that is, the aggregation of these large estates without interspersing them with small holdings—we shall experience none of the benefits derivable from settlement, and our immigration policy will result in comparative failure. If you do not give ground to persons who are prepared to hold small tenements they cannot and will not remain in the country. They will go to those countries where better provision is made, and where they can remain.

The remarks of Sir R. Douglas were equally to the purpose. He contended that the money derived from the sale of land should be devoted to making roads through it, and said : We find that the cost of maintaining the goals, lunatic asylums, and other public institutions is to be charged against the local revenue, and I should have imagined that the making of roads would have been a first charge against the proceeds of land sold; in fact, I have always been led to think that the wisest thing for a nation to do was to open up the land first, and sell it afterwards. And so it should be with regard to the roads, Wherever a block af land is to be opened up for sale, roads should be made through it first but the contrary has been the case in the Province of Auckland; and is likely to be the case everywhere throughout New 7.<*A*,-nA Whether that principle is right, I shall leave the Government to decide. I shall not oppose the Bill, and ! hope the honorable member for Bodney will withdraw his amendment and leave all responsibility—the credit or the blame—with the Government. The Premier referred to the forty-acre system. Well, Sir let me say that under that system some of the very best settlers in the Province of Auckland at the present moment were brought out. I do not think anyone in the province will deny that. But while the best men were brought out, they were given the w .°” t I remember the case of two brothers who were placed on iand of this description. They were too proud to Mg, and, being unable to makq a living off the land, one of them, who remained on the secbon, was found dead at his own fireside They say heart disease killed him. God knows it was starvation!” The sys*Bm gneceM ftd. because they got none but the poorest y B | Bit George Grey confirmed the state-

merits made by Sir K. Douglas, and with regard to the reruaiks of Mr Stafford, he observed

j He said in the most authoritative manner ; that the failure of Western Australia as a set- • tlement was to be attributed to the large grants jof laud and to the price of the land. I can say, from my own knowledge of the subject, that the honorable gentleman was wrong in that statement. It is impossible that a more erroneous statement could be made. The fact is that the grants made were in some instances mostly sandy desert, on which it was impossible for settlers to succeed in making a J living. The greater part of Western AustraI lia that was settled consisted of small fertile I strips of land along the rivers, with large tracts of bad land between them. The country was only capable of carrying a sparse population under any circumstances, and the failure of the settlers to accumulate the wealth that settlers in other colonies did is to be attributed, not to the price of land, not to the large grants of land that were given, but to the necessity of puttingtho settlements far from one another, owing to the inferior quality of the land. I can assure yon, Sir, from long observation and consideration of the subject from the fact of owning land there myself, and from every circumstance that could give a man personal knowledge, that is the real cause of the non-success of the settlers in amassing wealth. They have lived, however, in great comfort, although they have not acquired wealth; and Ido not believe there are any settlers in the world who are happier or live more comfortably than they do. The same remark was made with regard to the forty-acre settlers in Auckland but that remark was fully answered by the honorable member for Marsden. I declare to the House that many of the forty-acre settlers are amongst the ablest and most energetic men I have ever met, and that they form a community, in the part of New Zealand in which they reside, which will hereafter be one of the most valuable anywhere in the colony. He made some other remarks well worthy of attention. “ If” he said, “ the Government are determined to consider the'.welfare of the country at large, then the manner in which they propose to lock up large districts of land for pastoral purposes, and the mode in which they, propose that the land shall be paid for, cannot be justified. Both these proposals are unfair to the country, and to the people at large. Arrangements should bp made that every man who purchased Ipnd should have the right to run his stock on the waste land in his neighborhood, so as to enable him profitably to work his farm. The endeavor now made to perpetuate the state of things that exists, and to enrich a few favored people at the expense of the mass of the community, was most unjust and unfair.” Other speeches followed, but we must defer any reference to them to a future issue. The subject is one, as we observed at the outset, of great public interest, and it will be observed that with regard to it wo have at present r ither endeavored to give the views of others than to express our own ; but in our next we will enter more fully into the question than we could do in the present article without extending it to an undue length.