FRENCH WOOL BUYERS

Waimate Daily Advertiser, Volume XXIV, 18 December 1926, Page 4

FRENCH WOOL BUYERS

DEPOSIT BEFORE LANDING. ALLEGED PINPRICKING. Sour own correspondent] WELLINGTON, December 16 A statement published in the Wanganui Herald recently to the effect that the French wool buyers, who had just returned to New Zealand for the purpose of attending the annual sales, had begn harshly treated by the Customs Department in demanding a deposit of £lO apiece before they could he allowed to go about their business, has occasioned a considerable amount of curiosity and some indignation here and elsewhere. “The French wool buyers who are in New Zealand in connection with the wool sales,” the Herald’s story runs, “have been subject to a petty annoyance by the GoI yernment on landing in New Zealand irom Australia, where they have been staying in the off season. They state that they were charged £lO before, being allowed to land in the Dominion.” I Mentioning the matter to a prominent wool broker who is acting for the largest French buyer, a Herald representative was told it was understood the money would be refunded when the buyers left the country, which they must do within six months; but even with this proviso, the broker thought, the demand for a deposit was an indignity which should 'not be placed upon well known business men who were among New Zealand’s very best customers. ORDERS-IN-COUNCIL AGAIN. The fact of the matter is that the French wool buyers, as well as many other highly desirable foreigners, have been caught in the meshes of the postwar panic legislation passed by ParliaI inent in 1920 for the purpose, as it was imagined, of saving the country from an influx of undesirable people. The Immigration Restriction Amendment Act, um.Mig many superfluous provisions, substituted for the education test, previously applied to immigrants, carte blanche authority to the Governor by Order-in-Council to apply just what restrictions the Government of the day deemed desirable. British subjects are specially informed by the Act tljat “a person shall not be deemed to* be of British birth and parentage by reason that he or his parents, or cither of them, is a naturalised British subject,” and that “a person shall not be deemed to be actually of such specified nation or people by reason that he mr hjs parents, or either of them, is by naturalisation of any speciljed nation or people.” But, of course, there vvas no need for all this rigmarole. The Government by Order-in-Council has authority to exclude just whom it pleases and to impose such conditions as it fancies. If it objects to dark eyes or to fair haic it has powsr to save itself from these inflictions? - '<■ THE OFFICIAL VIEW.

When a very courteous officer of the Customs Department was seen to-day in regard to Uns matter he explained that rhe Department had nothing whatever to do with the framing of the law or with the issue of Orders in Council. Naturally he could not express any opinion concerning questions of policy. They, he emphasised, were the affairs of rhe Government. The duties of the Department were purely administrative. tie stated, however, that, so far as his own personal experience went, there had been no serious complaints n regard to the nominal deposit demand? ed from the wool buyers. It was usual lor the local representatives of the buy--ers to make arrangements for their act mission to the country without any avoidable delay or inconvenience. Tb* instructions to the officers of the Department were to facilitate any arrangement of that kind in every way possible. The demand for a deposit, certainly was not intended as a nin4 prick to the foreign buyers. Just what purpose it was intended to serve, this authority could not say; but if it was regarded as obnoxious in any way, be suggested, representations to that effect should be made by the aggrieved parties to the Minister. A CONFIDENT CONSUL. Mr O. IL Bendall. the local French Consul, was glad to be made acquainted with the facts of the case. He was sure there was no intention on the part of the New Zealand Government’ to place any indignity upon the French wool buyers. That, he reiterated, went without, saying. But he thought that ii the Minister responsible for the ad- :

ministration of the Immigration Restriction. Act were approached he would realise it was quite unnecessary to impose any monetary obligation upon the buyers. Jt was not the money itself that concerned them at all. They brought credits to New Zealand running into many thousands, and ten pounds, even it the sum were not recoverable, would be neither hero nor there. But the demand was suggestive, quite unintentionally of course, of mistrust and it was easy to understand the buyers, who were regular visitors to the Dominion, to the Dominion’s advantage, feeling a little affronted. It was not an expression of the comrade ship everyone wished to see maintained between the British and the French peoples. Mr Bendall was satisfied that when the matter was put to the Minister in this, light he would give it very sympathetic consideration. It was reasonable to assume that neither tb.e law nor the Order-in-Coitneil was intended to imply that French visitors to the Dominion could not be trusted beyond the sharp vision of the policeman.