SOLDIER SETTLEMENT.

Waimate Daily Advertiser, Volume XXIII, 16 May 1922, Page 2

SOLDIER SETTLEMENT.

„ REVALUATION OF LAND NEEDED. (By Our Special Representative). A recent visit to a friend in Cantrebury, who happens also to be a soldier settler, has impressed me very strongly that it is vitally necessary for the Government to at once review the wide position in regard to the settlement of soldiers upon the land —not alone out of consideration for the welfare for the settlers, but also because the prosperity of the Dominion is irrevocably bound up with the success or otherwise of the producers, and every producer who is unsuccessful as an indirect loss to the State and the community at large.

It was deemed a good policy to assist returned soldiers on to the land, and there is no question but that th e money spent in this way would have been returned one hun-dred-fold in the yeras to come, provided only that the settlements were successful and the setters prosper-

As it stands at present, however, ther e is throughout the length and breadth of New Zealand an awakening knowledge of the fact that practically all the lands bought for soldier settlements have been obtained at too high a cost and it is impossible that the settlers can continue to pay the highh rentals demanded and farm these properties with any degree of success. In the particular setlement which I visited the settlers were a good type, careful in their expenditure; and my informant, who was well qualified to judge, described them all as good workers; yet in the whole settlement there was not one who could show even one pound profit on the year’s working, and in most sases their original capital had been wholly swallowed up and hope for the future had departed. The postponement or even the remission of rent will not sufficiently meet the difficulties under wwhich these men are labouring, and th e only satisfactory method will be to set up an independent commission to go into the whole question of the values of these prop. ertie s under normal farming conditions, and th e evidence of independent valuers should be obtained for the purposes bf the inquiry, as there is a deep-seated objection on the part of Land Board valuers to mak e any admission that their previous valuations were an error of judgement.

lhe great point to be remembered is that the State i s the landlord of thes e vast areas set apart or purchased for the purpose of settling soldiers on them, and if by a nar-row-minded policy these settlers are starved off their selections there is only a very small chance that any new tenants the State may get will do any better or even as well as these lads hav e done, while the present soldier settlers, to whom we owe at least a fair deal, will be thrown amongst the ranks of the unemployed, broken, and dispirited men. Anzae Day reminded one very forcibly of the great sareifice these men and their dead comrades, over whose graves the red poppies grow, have made for civilisation. We have bragged of what we would do for them—let us then face the financial music, even to the extent of several millions, and write off the amounts by which these lands have been overvalued, so that the rentals on the new basis of value will be brought within the bounds of reason. In a recent statement to the press the Hon. Minister for Lands was reported to have said that only some 295 soldiers had left their farm s so tar; but I believe that unless some is taken urgently to provide e lef there will be a much greater number compelled to leave in the near future, and now is the time for our own Government to face the position and make arrangements for an immediate revaluation of all 1X7“““'"'“ “ P “ ehml