The Dominion THURSDAY, AUGUST 25, 1921. BIG-SCALE SETTLEMENT

Dominion, Volume 14, Issue 284, 25 August 1921, Page 4

The Dominion THURSDAY, AUGUST 25, 1921. BIG-SCALE SETTLEMENT

Whatever may come in Australia of tho scheme mooted by Sir Joseph Carruthers for settling “a million farmers on a million farms,” the scheme in itself contains features which well deserve practical attention in this country, and indeed in all parts of the Empire wfiere there are lands to bo peopled and made productive. There is nothing actually new in what Sir Joseph Carruthers has proposed, unless the idea of organising emigration from Great Britain and settlement overseas systematically and on a big scale is to be so described. For many years British capital has been flowing into the Dominions for investment, although since the outbreak of wai the flow, of necessity, has been severely restricted, and during the last year.or two Britain has been paying tho passages of approved emigrants proceeding to settle in other parts of the Empire. With minor exceptions, however, this is as far as matters 'have been carried. What Sir Joseph Carruthers has proposed in Australia is that capital should be raised in an amount sufficient to open up and develop large areas of land, by the construction of roads and railways and in other ways, so that British emigrants may be established in groups each numbering a hundred or more as “farmers associated together wit!? identical objects on similar land and in tho one neighbourhood.” The numerical strength of an individual group of farmer settlers would, of course, be limited only by the amount of land available in a given locality. It is selfevident that any partly-populated Dominion has much to gain from promoting development and settlement on these lines. The advantages to the Mother Country are equally obvious. Well-directed overseas settlement will enable her to place her surplus population to the utmost advantage, and as it proceeds will lighten the burdensome expenditure she is now compelled to make in relieving troubles of unemployment which threaten to become chronic. With its other claims to consideration, overseas settlement under sound conditions offers by far the best means of building up inter-imperial trade and providing an assured and expanding market for the British manufacturing industries which in the present state of, world affairs are faced by the prospect of keener competition than they have eVer yet experienced. Taking account also of the extent te which problems of Imperial defence will be simplified by the rapid increase of population in ths Dominions, the Mother Country ought to be more than willing to turn the greatest possible body of capital into the enterprise of overseas development and settlement. Apart from the payment of emigrants’ passages, this, of course, would bo done by way of loan investment'

In submitting his big scheme of group-settlemcnt to the Australian Federal authorities, Sir Joseph Carruthers made out a very impressive case. The great gain to the Commonwealth, he pointed out, would be that of additional population established in productive en,terprise on land which is now without value because it is not developed or occupied.

The annual public revenue per head of population (he added) is estimated at about -825. On this basis, every 166,060 units of population will increase the public revenues. State and Commonwealth, by .£2,560,000 a year. As this scheme is based on the fact that one farmer creates work for 21 other men, and that the families of male workers average three, by placing, for example, 10,000 new settlers on the land as farmers, and expending moneys for that purpose, the basis would be established for an increase of 140,000 men, women, and children in our population, worth, from a revenue point of view, .£3,500,000 a year. According to Sir Joseph Carruthers, it is within the capacity of the present generation to establish one million additional farmers in Australia, and raise the total population of the Commonwealth to twenty millions. This country has everything to gain from promoting a similar enterprise on a smaller scale. The way to national prosperity obviously must be found in making the utmost possible use of undeveloped and partly developed resources, and there is great scope for progress in this direction. Apart from lands still unoccupied, a great deal cf land held in large areas will be available for subdivision, the more so since it seems likely that oversea market conditions will expedite the development of dairy-farming and the subordination of cattleraising and other less intensive forms of primary production. Although the line of true progress is clearly defined, the present drift of population in the Dominion, as the census figures show, is from country to town. It is a vital condition of national welfare that this drift should be checked and if possible reversed, and probably there is no better way of achieving these results than by promoting a scheme of group settlement in which British capital would be employed in settling British emigrants on New Zealand farms. The. soldier settlement scheme, undertaken in condi-

tions in some respects unfavourable and in face of serious difficulties, has given some idea of what is possible in the way of rapid extension of settlement where a considerable body of capital is made available. If Britain can bo awakened to a full realisation of the advantages of oversea investment as a means of placing her surplus population and building up a better market for her manufactures within the Empire, it ought to be quite possible in this country to improve considerably upon the rate of settlement and subdivision attained under the soldier settlement scheme. The systematic co-ordination of immigration with settlement and subdivision on the lines suggested by Sir Joseph Carruthers offers the Dominions an assured means of arriving at a satisfactory solution of its economic and financial problems—a means not only of expanding primary industries, but of strengthening all forms of industry and lightening national burdens of debt and taxation by spreading them over more shoulders.