The Press. WEDNESDAY, MAY 20, 1914 Land Settlement.

Press, Volume L, Issue 14972, 20 May 1914, Page 8

The Press. WEDNESDAY, MAY 20, 1914 Land Settlement.

Nobody will be surprised to learn that * our "Liberal" friends aro a littlo doubtful as to their Leader's ideas upon land settlement, and aro hoping that when he makes another attempt to outline a land policy he will produce something bettor than anything he has yet been able to furnish. Their difficulty arises not less from his reluctance to choose any one of the many policies offered to him by the singleUx, Socialist, Red Fed., leasehold, and other sections of his multi-coloured following than from his inability to clear hie thouchts upon points of detail. In his speech at Xapter ho was oven more illogical than usual in his references to tho Lands -for Settlement policy. Since the present Government has carried out tho policy of purchasing estates for closer settlement, and has thqreby shattered one of the many foolish prophecies of the "Liberals" made during the election campaign of

1911, Sir Joseph "Ward and his faithful chorus deem it necessary to say that the system of purchaso is bad. Had the Government stopped the policy of purchase altogether, tho " Liberals" would of course Lave made a dreadful uproar concerning the wickedness of tho "Tories' , in killing the most beneficent policy ever devised by democratic statesmanship. But they must find Mr Matsoy wTong whatever ho does, and make an uproar at any cost, and so ; for soaio time past, they have been crying out that.the landpurchase policy is really a bad one, and is used by the Government only in order to pay high prices to their friends amongst tho landholders. This purely gratuitous suggestion of malpractice, we need hardly say, is as entirely without foundation as most of tho 'Liberal" stories, and it is, moreover, very unwise of the "Liberals'* to bring it forward, because it redirects attention to the fact that tho last case of an estate being purchased at a. sensationally extravagant pneo was a caso in which the purchaser was a preceding Government and tho vendor a stout friend of those in high places in the "Liberal" party.

Of course Sir Joseph "Ward nniy, if fie chooses, condemn tho esCato-pnr-chasing system as a good thing gone bad, and may take his chance of hearing the public say it is a most interesting coincidence' that he should find this out only after his expulsion from offico left tho work of administering tho .Act to somebody else. But he must really not claim the rigiit to condemn tho fiysteru which he once- extolled and at the came time to claim credit for tho results of its continued operation after his loss of office. Yet this is what he docs. Referring to v statement by Mr Massey, he denied that Mr Masse\* should receive the credit for having, in his first year of office, purchated 52,000 acres for settlement. "Tho Liberal Party," ho complained, '' had been making negotiations for tho purchase of this land "before M> Massey came into power, " but the Prime Minister took all tho "credit for it." Had he been logical, ho would hare said, not "credit,' , but "blame." What ho wants the public to believe* is that by a wonderful decree of Providenco the Lands for Settlement Agrt remained valuable only up to the last moment of his career as a Minister, and that, by a miracle which nobody can explain, the last acxo which it was wiso to purchase under tho Act was tho last aero that he purchased himself or arranged for. In tho presence of such an, impresvsive manifestation of tho ekill with which Providence adjusts tho affairs of tho world to suit the changes in tho fortunes of <: Liheralism," serious discussion of tho question may appear impertinent. But it certainly is a fact that tho work of purchaso becomes more difficult from tho financial point of view as time passes. Mr Massoy told a Wairarapa deputation that he is considering tho matter, and indicated that he is putting into motionthe Act of last year, under which ho may arrange with landowners to subdivide their properties and offer tho sections for leaso or for.sale, tho new settlers undertaking to pay off tho purchase price in. from ten to twenty years.

! The Opposition Loader may or may not Lave a plan. All he will say j s that " the system should be changed, so that " men who owned largo areas -would be i "compelled to cut them np. These 'land-owners," ho added, "would, how- " ever, be treated fairly and equitably." Hia hint as to tho wisdom of fair and equitable treatment seems already to havo aroused tho irritation of that win,:* •of his party which insists that "Liberalism" is nine-tontha the same as Red Fedism; and it is this point which will make difficulties for the framer of tho "Liberal" land policy. The oxtremists of the Opposition, of course, are ready to face the whole farming community as their enemies, by pressing forward the doctrine, unon which their theories are built, thnt every man who owns land is ipso facto a man to bo preyed upon by the rest of the community, if, indeed, lio is not to be regarded as a thief arid an enemy of the nation. Sir Joseph Ward lias sufficient sonso left to shrink from this bold lino. But until he can present a clear land policy in opposition to the Government's, ho has no locus standi in the discussion. We would bo content, however, if he at least did not ask us to accept such illogical nonsense as ho has been talking about the Lands for Settlement Act.