FOULING THE NEST. The Sin of Pessimism.

Free Lance, Volume VI, Issue 274, 30 September 1905, Page 6

FOULING THE NEST. The Sin of Pessimism.

MR E. G. Jellicoe, formerly a Wellington lawyer and now a candidate for a seat in the British House of Commons, came back to New Zealand the other day and raised a "dust." It isn't a nice dust, and it is a dust that will do* a lot of harm at Home. It is a peculiar fact that colonials themselves decry the land they live in to the Home folk, and comprise what is now justly known throughout Australasia as "The Stinking-fish Party." Mr. Jellicoe's belief m the statesmanship of Mr. G H Reid, or his reiteration of the old and wearying "six hatters' " story, does not really matter, because everybody knows that the hatters are now Australian citizens — they were not kept out of Australia— and Mr. G. H. Reid is a politician, and lives on the industry. He considers it cruelty to attract Englishmen to the great land of Australia because of the laboiir conditions and the restrictive immigration laws. • • ? It is much more cruel of Mr Jellicoe to denounce Australia, and to pretend that any British subject is unwelcome there. The representatives of all the States and of New Zealand have a hard fight in London to counteract the wild and harmful statements of pessimists and notoriety hunters. The fact that State Premiers are favourable to the introduction of five thousand families under the Booth scheme gives the lie to the pretence that Australia does not desire population. The five thousand families will assuredly be "contract labourers." • • * Having decided to leave New Zealand to its fate, it is unkind of Mr Jellicoe to give this end of the earth the worst possible name — to blame the institutions that have made the life of the worker livable, and which have consequently been

the largest means of attracting workers from Britain. What exstatistician Coghlan calls "the plague of ill-formed criticism" is the worst possible advertisement for countries that need population, the said countries doing all they can to attract instead of repelling the Home-born. * * * The British press is not quite sure where New Zealand is, and it bunches Australia and this colony together. Therefore, when a man of Mr. Jelhcoe's calibre speaks he is accepted as an authority on the subject, the newspapers found "bitmg" satires on his statements, and the work of the "Stinking-fish Party" is enlarged until most of the things that are true about the colonies are left unsaid, and mast of the things that are "coloured" are said to our detriment People should have some respect for the welfare of the colonies they leave. They do incalculable harm to the colonies, and give the press — particularly the Australian press — the very best reasons for becoming very angry indeed at the constant attacks and exaggeration that are accepted as truth m the Old Country.