YOUNG MAORI PARTY.

King Country Chronicle, Volume IV, Issue 222, 5 January 1910, Page 5

YOUNG MAORI PARTY.

At the annual conference of the northern division of the Young Maori Party, held last week, Mr Paul, chairman of the industry section, read a paper on the industrial side of Maori life and the progress made by the Natives in various pursuits, principally farming. He pointed out that in Taranaki a small number of Natives had made successful daiiry farmers, whilst in the Upper Wanganui, several families hai settled on bush lands with favourable results., Futher south, among the Ngatiapa, whose lands had been individualised, sheep farming on a small scale, and grain growing on a fairly extensive scale, had be'en carried out for years by the Natives. In the Wairarapa and oh "the east coast, Maoris had also taken up pastoral pursuits with satisfactory results. Dr Te Rangihiroa, M.P., said that the note for the party should be work, and what was wanted by the Maori was assistance in agricultural education and financial facilities to enable those who desired to settle upon their own land as farmers. Mr Thornton, headmaster of Te Aute College, said Mr Paul's paper would help to prove the fallacy of the statement so often heard from the man in the street. There were, he said, a lot of peopl! who, because they s=»w one drunken Maori, concluded that all Maoris were drunkards, and because they had met a lazy Maori branded all Maoris as lazy. They had proved they could work and work well. Dr Te Rangihiroa.moved, and Mr G. G. Paul seconded—"That this Conference ask the Minister of Agriculture to favourably consider the granting of agricultural scholarships to Maori boys, as promised by Mr. McNab to the Maori Congress of 1908, and consider the advisability of extending the functions of the inspectors of the department in Maori districts to give practical advice and assistance to Maori farmers." This was carried.