LAND SETTLEMENT

New Zealand Times, Volume XLIV, Issue 10274, 8 May 1919, Page 3

LAND SETTLEMENT

(To the Editor I; N.Z. Times.")

c; r _Your leader of May sth, as far awards soldiers' land, will be endorsed 'uy many landowners if your contentions aro applied to. sodien.over thirty years of age, physically unfit 01 without adequate capital of their own. Those who hava not these three Handicaps, and are willing to work, will make any class of land pay We have Eot botn classes coming back, and must provide for each. In urging increased graduated land taxation, do you not think the tune has come tor concrete proposals? Why not &ay how much? No one wants taxation applied to such an extent that farming lands would be thrown on the market in excess of requirements, unless it is those lunatics who are obsessed with the conviction that all who are tannin" are making millions. Why do you emphasise that the half of the increased land values go into the pockets of six or seven thousand graduated land taxpayers, and ignore tho otlicr half which tho smaller landowners, or some of them, are dividing? Jt is the voting-power of tins latter class which perpetuates the abuses we are seeking to remedy, and we all know that no Government which deliberately set out to reduce land values would last a month. Unused land in country with roads and railways must be a very negliblo quantity. The present price of land makes it unpayable, not used to the limit of its capacity is probably true in most cases, but land aggregators are almost invariably those who are taking the .most out of their land. That is a. hard, unpalatable truth. lam as convinced as anyone of the evils of aggregation, but if we are to arrive at a satisfactory solution we must recognise acts, and not allow prejudice to, disturb our vision. Would you advocate putting soldier-settlers on our best opened-up land at present-day prices of i-»0 to £l2O an acre? They would need- to be expert farmers to make it pay. Some would; but what of those who, either from misfortune or inability, could not? What an uproar if it were proposed to evict them! four contention that it would pay the -State better to abandon our undeveloped land is directly opposed to that of the Minister for Lands, who says wc cannot afford to leave them in their present state. Had your contention been tho opinion of the n»ajp»tv 50 years ago this would bo a different country now. That there is a cemand for this country, and faith m their capabilities, is shown by the tact that settlement all over is ahead ot the roads. What of our ISew Zealand boys who are growing up, want to so on the land, and are prepared to tackle back country? As a business proposition, is it better to give them: a chance to do so successfully, or are they not wanted at all? Thero is a danger that all this talk of land for soldiers will obscure the land settlement question altogether. Beth' will have to /be tackled intelligently; at present both are l>oing plaved with, perhaps because we have nut little men in to manage a big iob „«a it » tema '*™ g™«f*«-