AS OTHERS SEE US.

Hauraki Plains Gazette, Volume XXXV, Issue 4651, 21 January 1924, Page 4

AS OTHERS SEE US.

NEW ZEALAND'S SORRY PLIGHT.

NO ROOM FOR IMMIGRANTS.

TORONTO, November 30.

In the Toronto Star, J. Jackson, writing as a returned soldier, fells wl'.at he considers the .true conditions in New Zealand. He says :—Walking along the waterfront in Auckland, New Zealand, recently,, I met a young returned Canadian soldier wearing his button. Being a returned man myself we fell into a chat, and this is what he told me. He had been in New Zealand ten weekfc, and was still looking for work. He was a young, strong man, willing to do any thing, as he put it, with three square meals a day in it. He told me he had been sleeping in an empty railway carriage for over a week since his money was done. This young man is only one of hundreds of immigrants going to Nev; Zealand and Australia, pnly to find bn arrival that the stories of prosperity are a myth, and that the government which enticed them there has completely and conveniently for* gotten them. Why? Because they have nothing to offer them but hign rents, dear living, and scenery, none of which interest a new isettler in any countiy. Furthermore, the people of New Zealand do not want them, as they rightfully claim that new immigrants whom they cannot absorb on'y bring wages down and make the housing shortage more acute than it already is. THE REASON GIVEN. What, the reader will ask, is the cause of this state of affairs ? The simple reason is that practically all New Zealand’s known resources: are about exhausted, with the exception of two or three coal mines in the South Island, and her agriculture. The kauri gum fields are’ being dug over and the soil washed to get what little gum remains. The goldfields are about worked out or de not pay to work. The gaunt, deserted ore crushers telF- their own Story. The town of Thames,- which once had a population of over 17,000,'’- to-day has le?,s than 3000 people in it. New Zealand’.s forests;- as far as merchantable timber is concerned, do not nearly supply her own> needs, and though the Government >• are now using prison labour. to plant large areas with trees it will be many years before these can be cut. New Zealand has, therefore, to rely on. her agriculture and-its dependent industries to absorb the tide of immigration to her shores. HIGH PRICE OF‘LAND. Let me say without fear pf truthful contradiction that the agricultural labour market is heavily ovcrstacked at present. ' One or two main reasons for this is that the large'stations do not employ many men in proportion to their huge areals. The other is the exorbitant price of land. As much as 1000 dollars per acre has to be paid ill order to own a farm in the Taranaki district. The price of land varies from 300 dollars to 1000 dollars. This same land is worth from 100 dollars to 350 dollars per acre as a farming proposition, and must be fed. every year with expensive manure to ensure a crop even of grass.