"OUR CHIEF DEFENCE."

Press, Volume LXI, Issue 18415, 23 June 1925, Page 14

"OUR CHIEF DEFENCE."

BRITISH-BORN IMMIGRANTS. ' Declaring that the- immigration of British-born people is vital to the country, the annual report submitted at the Dominion Conference of the New Zealand Returned Soldiers' Association at Dunedin on Tuesday .expresses the opinion that tho "nominated system','. appeared to be inadequate to meet the needs of the Dominion.:;

the report quotes figures to show that there was a decrease of 2000 immigrants in 1923 compared with the. number in 19is2, but a glance, at: ".the total of those who arrived without, any Government i assistance at Ail ; showed that the Dominion's immigration schemes were responsible for introducing'only about 60 per cent, of the total number of immigrants in 1923. ''The nominated immigrants throw very little responsibility upon the Government for their absorption into New Zealand life, bacauso their nominators, undertake to find employment and provide maintenance for them alter arrival," continues the report. "With a comparatively young country like New Zealand the immigration and land policies must go together; this Dominion has the land, and it wants the immigrants. "The excess of arrivals over departures," the report added, "for the year 1923 was 6820, and the average excess under this head, taken over the past ten years, was less than 6500; therefore," at the present rate of progress, in order to. obtain half a million immigrants it would be necessary to wait for about seventy-six - years—unless something was done by the Government to improve matters "The Government must make some effort," continued the report, "to coordinate these two policies in order to satisfy the Dominion's *reat need—population. The, nominated system is increasing our inhabitants, but there should be additional systems, say, e.g., special, selection in the United Kingdom with a view to farm training in New Zealand and eventual settlement on Crown farm lands. | "This Dominion should look to a fully-occupied country as its chief defence—other countries could do with fresh fields for their millions, and if money is not sufficiently invested in order to \ populate New Zealand with our own stock the time may come I when the decision will not be left in our own hands."