PIONEER SETTLER.

Gisborne Times, Volume V, Issue 87, 22 April 1901, Page 2

PIONEER SETTLER.

The New Zealand Times states the pioneer will find no difficulty in meeting his obligations to the State, if the State spends money freely enough in roading the pioneer districts. The crying want is of money for roads. In this climate, and with our soil, the astonishing thing is the celerity with which the bush gives place to grass. The transformation, when the pioneer is a man of energy and resource, takes place in a single season. But of what use is this marvellous fact, if the produce of the transformed holding sticks in the mud on the road to a market or to a creamery ? The finances of the country are, happily, in a sufficiently flourishing state to find ways and means of enabling the settler to do justice to the transformation of his own energetic effecting. It should be the aim of the Government to spread the surplus over the face of the pioneer country in those prolific channels which we call roads and bridges. The Government, which has not been unmindful of tins vital service in the past, should now push it forward with a vigour proportionate to the greatness of the subject. It is not amendment of the Land Act which is here required, so much as an increase in the rate of progressive investment. The pioneer pays a large rental to the Government, and with assistance of this nature will pay a rental very much larger. The venture has in it the elements of success. There arc signs that the Government understand this ; amongst others, there is the separation recently effected, as announced, of the roading section of the growing Department of Lands. We trust this is evidence of a determination to push ahead with this most vitally important work.