FOR LABOUR

Evening Post, Volume CVIII, Issue 141, 11 December 1929, Page 14

FOR LABOUR

MR. HOLLAND SPEAKS

BIG MEETING AT MOERA

THE LAND POLICY

Under the Reform Government there had been developed in regard to the land of New Zealand, not a freehold system, but a mortgage-hold system, under which the working farmer was as relentlessly in tho grip of tho mortgagee as the Irish tenant was in the grip of the Irish landlord in the days gone by, declared Mr. H. E. Holland, M.P. (Leader of the Labour Prfrty), addressing at the Community Hall, Moera, last night a largo audience presided over by Mr. I. C. Kennedy.

Our New Zealand land laws,'he said, must be so rewritten as to end the system1 of land aggregation that had grown up under the Reform Party, and break up the large estates and settle

the land in small holdings. Thero wore some 87,000 holdings in the Dominion, aggregating 43,500,000 acres. But nearly 30,000,000 were in the hands of about 7000 landholders, while less than 14,000,000 acres were in the hands of some 80,000 holders; and what was true of aggregation in regard to area was true also in regard to aggregation in jalues. The Labour Party's land policy, when it came into office, as it assuredly would do sooner or later — (applause)—would be to ,put ou a steeply graduated land tax to force the larger estates into occupation. They of the Labour Party held that it was better to have ten families running 1000 sheep on ten separate holdings than to have one family running 10,000 sheep on a largo area. (Applause.) Their policy also included the acquisition of large estates by means of purchase by negotiation and, where necessary, by compulsion, in order that a largo number of people could be placed ori the land. And they would lay it down, as a foundation principle that the main roads must be put through before the land was settled. * FAMILY ALLOWANCES.

On the social side, stated Mr. Holland, the Labour Party wanted to institute a basic wage that would afford a good living for. every working man and woman—New Zealand was rich enough in natural resources to afford that —and also to increase the family allowances, not by docking the wages of the single men, but out of the Consolidated Fund. The Ecforrn Party in 1925 had led the people' to believe that it was going to give .a family allowance of 7s 6d per child out of the Consolidated Fund; but when the Bill came down it gave an allowance of only 2s per child. Arid the Labour Party asked Reformers if they thought they could afford it. (Laughter.) It was clear that in 1895 the Keforra Party had wholly misled the peoplo in regard to family allowances, and had thereby won thousands of votes. (Applause.) Whether by the present United Party Government or by • a Labour Government, the family allowance had to be increased to such an extent as to do away, with the disability that attached to the large family. All parties had declared that New Zealand's best immigrant was the immigrant by way of the cradle; yet the basic wage, based on_ what a man and wife and two children could live upon, imposed a hardship on every family with a larger number of children. A family of six eight, or ten children had to be maiiifained on tho same basic wage as a family of only two children. That was utterly wrong; and the Labour Party proposed such a family allowance system as would give every child in the large family an 'equal chance with every child in the small family. (Applause.) MR. COATES AND KIS CANDIDATE.

Dealing with workers' compensation, Mr. Holland declared for a State monopoly of accident insurance, so that the bulk of the premiums paid would go in benefits to the workers, not in huge profits to the insurance companies. Referring to immigration, he said that the Reform Party's immigration policy had been largely responsible for the present unemployment in New Zealand. Mr. Harold Johnston, the Reform candidate, had roundly • condemned Mr. Coates's immigration policy; and he (Mr. Holland) would be interested to see how Miv Coates wouia reply to his very candid candidate. (Laughter and applause.) Mr. Holland expounded at considerable length the Labour Party's continued fight against the Public Service "cuts" and its policy ia regard to their restoration. "The Reform Party," he remarked, used the axe as the poultry-farmer used it, and the public servants, got the axe where the chicken got it." (Laughter and applause.) Ho declared that the Reform Party had, in effect, reduced the public servants' wages in order to make tax remissions to the wealthy landowners and the men with big incomes; and at the time when the Reformers said that they could not restore the cuts it voted £1,000,000 for the Singapore Base, which several naval experts had condemned. The public servants wanted redress, he said; and they must have it. But the way to get redress was by no such foolishness as a strike, but by giving a good solid vote for Nash on polling day. (Applause.) By doing that, the Hutt electors would give a lead to the rest of New Zealand for the next election—a lead nob only to the public servants, but to the whole of the workers of New Zealand, who also needed redress from the result of the efforts of the Reform Government to force down and keep down wages. (Loud applause.) One or two minor questions were put to and answered by Mr. Holland. Mr. Nash also briefly addressed the meeting, saying that he had just addressed the best meeting that the Labour Party had ever had at Blackbridge, and had been accorded a unanimous vote of thanks and confidence.