RAILWAYS AND NATIVE LANDS.

King Country Chronicle, Volume IV, Issue 253, 23 April 1910, Page 5

RAILWAYS AND NATIVE LANDS.

The claims of the North Island to a more equitable proportion of expenditure for railway development have a warm advocate in Mr J. P. Luke, M.P. for Wellington Suburbs. "I am no parochialist," he remarked to a "Herald" interviewer before his departure from Auckland for Wellington, "and when the question is brought -before the House next session, as it will most surely be, I shall come right cut on the carpet.in supporting what I consider a just cause." He thought, however, that the. promises made to Central Otag">, for instance, would cause the South Island to continue to score for the time being. Mr Luke emphasised his belief that if New Zealand is to be developed on just and advantageous lines there is urgent need" for the question of railway construction to receive consideration from the point of view of what is best for the people of the Dominion as a whole. A question vitally affecting the issue was the problem of how to attract population to enormous areas of undeveloped land in the North Island, which were only awaiting the advent of railways to prove their productiveness. "As I travel over the Main Trunk raliway and over the lines in other districts," said Mr Luke, "I am more and more forcibly struck with the vast stretches of native lands which are being mastered by noxious elements instead of by thrifty development. The question is how long the pepple of New Zealand will tolerate these lands being tied.up by the native disabilities." There was nothing, Mr Luke thought, that would extend the prosperity of the Dominion more than the "vigorous acquirement of native lands upon sound and honest lines with -the object of expediting railway construction. Mr Luke is of opinion that the completion of the lines between Napier and Gisborne and between Stratford and the Main Trunk, together with the extension of the North of Auckland railways, would be the foundation for a Degressive policy of railway construction, quite sound and calculated to serve the best interests of New Zealand as a whole.