SOLDIER SETTLEMENT

Dominion, Volume 12, Issue 267, 7 August 1919, Page 4

SOLDIER SETTLEMENT

Expenditure in connection with tho soldier settlement scheme is running into big figures, and although no fault need be found with it on that account so long as the settlement is carried out on sound lines, it is evidently incumbent on the Government to lay its plans carefully as its activities in this direction extend. From a statement made by the Minister of Lands at the end of last week it appears that already an outlay of about five millions has been incurred in providing ex-soldiers with country holdings and giving some of them a further measure oi financial assistance, and that in addition advances totalling more than £800,000 have been made for the purchase and erection of dwellings. In view of the great demand still to be met before the process of repatriation is completed these arc somewhat staggering figures. If expectations arc realised, the financing of soldier settlement ,will be a highly-profitable investment for the State, assuring not only the ultimate return of capital but great v and lasting benefits in tho shape of steadily expanding production and trade. It is very necessary, however, alike in the interests of soldier settlers and in order to ensure the stability of the scheme as a whole, that everything possible should be done to cheek tho further inflation of the price of land. Naturally, in its efforts to obtain land for a large number of. soldiers within a limited period tho Government is fared by some perplexing problems. Its own operations have done much to intensify the demand for land and, as Mr. Guthrie • pointed out to a Returned Soldiers' Association deputation on Saturday last, numbers of those from whom tho Government has purchased estates I)Avo < entered the land market and so assisted to increase prices. The need of regulating such conditions is more obvious than are effective means to that end, but several suggestions have been raised which seem more or less* entitled to consideration. _ The Returned Soldiers' Association, for instance, is proposing that the Government should require vendors to take up first mortgages., on the land they tell, and the Government itself assist soldier settlors by taking up second mortgages. The Minister himself, as he informed the returned soldiers nwho interviewed him on Saturday, is considering an arrangement under which it would be compulsory for the, vendor to accept war bonds. Either arrangement offers obvious advantages in tho way of lightening the immediate financial burdens the Government is called upon to'bear, but some considerations of equity arc involved. It is a question how far it is permissible to go in requiring landowners to accept restrictions on 'interest or on the free realisation and investment \of capital from which other members-of tho community •are immune. It seems not unlikely that landowners may bo called upon, in the_ interests of settlement and' subdivision, to make some such concession. Obviously, however, it would he no sound method of extending settlement to unfairly invade existing rights in land, and such an invasion, of course, would lie entailed if any serious disability wore imposed on those who voluntarily or under compulsion, dispose of their land to the State. Whatever may be accomplished by varying the conditions of land purchase, it is evidently incumbent on the Government to make the most of whatever alternatives exist to this policy. In particular, wherever there are Crown lands of potential value at present inaccessible or otherwise calling for development work in order that they may lie brought into profitable.use, full consideration ought to be given to the possibility of offering returned soldiers jmploymoht in such work as a stop towards obtaining a holding. Presumably a proportion at least of returned men would prefer to obtain a _ relatively cheap holding on these lines rather than settle down to work off a heavy mortgage on improved but high-priced land. The amount of virgin land of any value still to be brought into use in this way is no doubt limited, but there 1 must be many districts in which a well-planned scheme of development work would pave the way for extensive subdivision. Under tho right conditions money expended on these lines ought to go much further _in _ promoting settlement and subdivision than what is spent on improved areas where little development work remains to be done.