BACKBLOCK MEN

Waipukurau Press, Volume XXXI, Issue 46, 25 February 1936, Page 8

BACKBLOCK MEN

PRIMARY CONSIDERATION STATES HON. R. SEMPLE l Ver i-ress Association.) ELTHAM, Last Night. ‘ ‘Tar-sealed roads and the like, have to take second place until the wants of the men in the backblocks have been attended to,” stated the Minister of Public Works, Hon. R. Semple, in the course of his reply to several deputations from local bodies at Eltham to-day. “Of primary consideration,” he added, “are the crying needs, of back-country settlers, many of whom have to take their chance and swim a river in order to reach civilisation.” The Minister said that the Government’s generous offer of assistance to stricken areas could not be taken as a precedent to be applied to normal times and normal requirements. ( He emphasised particularly that State assistance was only to meet extraordinary flood damage where settlers had lost communication with markets and the outside world. New Zealand would have to redistribute its population from the cities to the country, but before that could be done the Government must give reasonable access to those settlers who had been sent out to the back country and who were, in many cases, virtually isolated. This would give encouragement to others to go on the land. The Minister had a very busy morning, receiving score of deputations, and in the afternoon left for Hawera.