WHAT REMAINS TO BE DONE.

Evening Post, Volume CXII, Issue 57, 4 September 1926, Page 12

WHAT REMAINS TO BE DONE.

There remains much still to bo done. Tho Native land legislation, which has been amended added to sinco the consolidating Act of 1909, is ready for an extensive overhaul and consolidation. If the consolidation of Native land interests is a desirable policy to extend to all parts of the Dominion, then tho sooner a staff is created for the work the better. The financial assistance now available to Maori farmers, it must be stated, is not rendered from State moneys. Theoretically the resources of the State Loan Departments, Public Trust, Government Life Insurance, and State Advances, ;ire available to pakeha and Maori alike. In practice tho loan applications from Maoris are concentrated on tho Native Trustee and the Maori Land Boards, which administer moneys derived entirely from Maori resources. The State, to put itself right, must supplement these funds, and, as supervision is essential to tho success of the scheme, the Departments now specialising in Maori loans should also handle the supplementary funds. The decided increase in tho Maori population revealed by the recent,. Census will accentuate other problems. The area of good land remaining to the Maoris is steadily decreasing. The youth of the race are receiving better education. The economic conditions are becoming more and more complicated. Sooner or later problems of unemployment and indigence and difficulties of a racial character will arise, unless steps are taken to incorporate the additional human material in the common activities of tho people of the Dominion. In this respect Mr. Coates has made a good beginning by arranging with the Public Service Commissioner that a proportion of Maori lads who pass the Civil service examination shall be offered employment in State Departments. The Education Department and the governing bodies of the Maori secondary schools- can do much to adjust the curriculum of the schools to the needs of the time. The large majority of the Maoris of the future must depend on other resources than their lands.

Instruments for recording the weather have been sent nearly five miles high by means of kites.