MR. A. W. HOGG'S CAMPAIGN.

Dominion, Volume 2, Issue 583, 11 August 1909, Page 5

MR. A. W. HOGG'S CAMPAIGN.

— *-■ —. SPEECH AT SHANNON. Ia spite of the wet evening, a largo audience assembled in the Druids' Hall on Monday night,-when Mr. A. W, Hogg, M.P., delivered an address. Mr. W. Murdoch, an old friend of the ex-Minister, briefly introduced tho speaker. . ■ • After referring to the reception accorded him throughout the country, Mr. Hogg said that,, after taking office as Minister for Roads and Bridges, Customs; and Labour, he : had considered that it was his duty to go round the country and -make himself conversant .with the conditions prevailing. While on his tour he had opportunities of ascertaining from settlers themselves what was most urgently required in the way of roads and bridges. He had noted that some of these settlers in-the King Country could only get 6d. or 7d. per ,Ib. fo-r butter-fat, and the cost of bringing merchandise into Kawhia and other localities was £8 per ton. At this time of the year a settler could bury his horse in some of these roads. The very eyes of this country bad been picked out by speculators, but still under our native legislation; the Land Board was able to. give leases of thirty years. Such leaseholders were ..not settlers,'but speculators pure and simple. The land in many of tbese cases had not been ploughed or fenced. When he went back,to Wellington,'he;simply kept his warrant. Something like two million acres ,of such land had , passed, with the connivance of the Cabinet,- into the hands of speculators. "Calling attention to this state of matters," said Mr. Hogg, "was one of my offences." In Wellington he was besieged by the unemployed, and ho could do nothing; retrenchment was the order. But while up in' the country he saw .that there was labour for thousands of men. He was determined to make known the state of affairs, and that was the reason why he made that celebrated speech which brought down the wrath of' the party to which he belonged, and led to his resignation. For nearly twelve months, the Advances to Settlers office had practically stopped payment. He bad suggested that, some of the. unemployed should be sent to the King Country, and the reply which he' got from the Native Minister was that these lands were not yet surveyed. It was "taihoa" here, "taihoa" there, "taihoa" everywhere. The Ministerial, press, which always protects vested interests when they are* sealed, had said that he was indiscreet, and the Premier had repudiated his speech. He had had no alternative but to resign. Mr. Hogg compared' himself to the victim of a wolf-raid in Russia.- Someone had to be •thrown to the wolves, and he had been tho victim. "I made ray dramatic exit from the Cabinet," continued the speaker, "the Premier made his dramatic exit from the country to- fix up the 'Dreadnought' business and raise loans. His danger signal is the flag of Jingoism; mine is the flag of freedom. The voice of the people is ringing over. New Zealand in my favour," Referring to land legislation, Mr. Hogg said that in sixteen years, so far from diminishing the number of largo estates, tho actual increase under the Liberal Administration had been 57. He would always be opposed to estate aggrega- I tion and land .monopoly. One effective way ] to check monopolies was to employ Mr. Ballance's weapon —to treat those estates as dutiable luxuries. The purpose of the graduated land tax was to unlock land for labour, | and yet both Government and Opposition declined to use it. In the speaker's opinion, tho only reason for the financial stringency ■was that banks began to haul in. After expanding.- tliov were contracting. Two things ho should like tho people to keep bofore them —proper administration of land and establishment of a State Currency. At tho conclusion of' his address, Mr. Hogg was accorded a vote of thanks and confidence in his being a suitable person to lead the Liberal-Labour party.