SOUTHERN MAORI SEAT.

Press, Volume L, Issue 15037, 4 August 1914, Page 5

SOUTHERN MAORI SEAT.

ADDRESS BY MR ELUSON.

3Lr J. M. Ellison, the Government nominee for the Southern Maori .seat at, the general elections, in an address to the Natives residing at Rapata, dealt principally with- the remarks made by Mr Parata down South, that it was "through the present Government that the Maori had been given tho right to dispose of his land. Ine speaker pointed' out to the meeting that what Mr Parata had stated, was incorrect. He then asked his hearers to look back to 1908 when a meeting was held at Puketerafa, near Danedin, and at which Mr Parata drafted out a petition praying the Ward party, then m oower. to remove all restrictions off native land, thus giving the younger oeople power to sell part of their land, ancf so raise sufficient money to cultivate the balance Upon that petition the Native Land Act of 1909 was passed. Regarding the statement that the Massey Government had given the native an open hand for dealing with his land, Mr Ellison said that that was not so, but it had given, the native a fair deal is this way—that if a native, occupying land •in certain reserves, wanted to sell he could do so, but the Government would not force him to sell. «,.-,, ■»» At the conclusion of his address Mr Ellison was heartily cheered, and accorded a vote of thanks