The Telephone. PUBLISHED EVERY TUESDAY, THURSDAY, AND SATURDAY MORNINGS, GISBORNE, SATURDAY, DECEMBER 15, 1883. EMIGRATION AND IMMIGRATION.

Poverty Bay Standard, Volume I, Issue 22, 15 December 1883, Page 2

The Telephone. PUBLISHED EVERY TUESDAY, THURSDAY, AND SATURDAY MORNINGS, GISBORNE, SATURDAY, DECEMBER 15, 1883. EMIGRATION AND IMMIGRATION.

Eveb since the introduction of the immigration scheme by Sib Julius Vogel, the majority of liberal politicians have, we think, been in favor of assisted emigration,—it has seemed and, no doubt, seems still to them a grand thing to get people to “ settle on the waste lands of the Colony,” and if such a measure could be carried out satisfactorily New Zealand would be a good field for its operations. But, unfortunately, the immigration movement has not proved a marked success in this Colony- —not only for the reason that the price of land has been too high, but from the fact that a good selection of emigrants in the mother country has not been made, in consequence of the wretched muddle in the carrying out of the details of the scheme. Shortly after Mr. Vogel initiated his emigration and immigration measures, it was pointed out to him that the system adopted of appointing emigration agents at Home was a sad mistake, and so it has proved, for the reason that the agents in the sea-ports, as a rule, cared nothing for the qualifications of the

persons sent to them, and the authorities in country towns and villages were only too glad to get clear of the “ loafers ” who idled away their time at beer-houses. The sea-port agent was allowed a certain amount for each emigrant he sent away, and, as a rule, little did he care whether the men forwarded to him from the country were farm-laborers, tailors, or factory-hands; besides which, the work-houees furnished “ suitable persons,” and the official received his head-money. The pamphlet published by the New Zealand Government, at a great expense, was also a great failure, as the assertions made in it were most extravagant, and people in the mother country placed

no confidence in the badly-compiled production. We repeat that it was pointed out to Mr. Vogel that the detailed arrangements of his scheme would prove a failure, and it was also suggested to him that emigration agents should be selected from those who had had much Colonial experience, —that an agent should be sent to the district in which he had been brought up ; so that, while he visited farm-laborers at their homes, confidence should exist between him and those he sought to enlighten as to the advantages to be gained by their settling in this Colony. It was also suggested to Mr. Vogel that he should instruct the agent to publish a weekly paper at Home, comprising extracts tromthe leading New Zealand papers, each industry being properly classified, showing the agricultural and pastoral returns in different districts, as well as mineral and other resources of this

Colony. The paper should have been subsidised by the New Zealand Government, by its taking some thousands of copies and circulating them throughout Great Britain, so that the national resources of the Colony would have been brought under the notice of capitalists as well as agriculturalists, and we contend that had that course been adopted New Zealand would now be a truly prosperous Colony. Unfortunately, the Premiers of this Colony have been too “ wise in their own conceit,” and the wretched muddles perpetrated by different Governments in the transaction of public business is a subject for much condemnation and regret. We firmly assert that the egotism of Mr. Vogel and his advisers, or a disinclination to take advice, has been the means of considerably retarding the progress of this Colony ; and we may also point out that immigrants have been placed, or settled on lands in the Colony from which they cannot possibly work out a livelihood. The Land Co.’s, acquisition at Leichfield for instance. A great portion of the land that Co. so generously offers to immigrants is not worth the plough brought into use to stir up the wretched soil. In the Forty Mile Bush, too, where there is a Government settlement, the soil is very poor, and we understand, the settlers—poor immigrants—have to take to road and bush work to make a living. We now find, from a Napier contemporary, that “ an emigration organisation is being attempted in the Seventy Mile Bush,” and that “ the project appears to be one to enable the poorer class of bush settlers to leave this Colony, and seek a new home in America. The passage-money, it is said, will not be more than £l2 per adult ; the vessel is to leave Napier some time in April, and sail straight to the happy land. Of all places in the world that has been pitched upon Puget Sound is the destination of these dissatisfied New Zealand settlers, of whom we are told there are already two hundred ready to go, and whose departure is only delayed for the want of one hundred more.” This, if correct, is certainly a rather deplorable state of affairs, and we unhesitatingly assert that the Governments of this Colony areresponsible—through their culpable negligence—in bringing out unsuitable people as immigrants to “ settle ” on more unsuitable land. Vast tracts of country are being held by unscrupulous speculators, who care nothing for the future prospects of immigrants, so long as they can dispose of land acquired at a mere nominal figure for fancy prices. There is no question, we think, that the result of the settlement of immigrants on land obtained by Land Companies will be that—after improvements, such as fencing, ploughing, Ac., are effected—the holdings must fall back into the hands of the former owners, and poor creatures will have dragged out a hard existence for years to find themselves in the end almost penniless. A grave responsibility rests on the Government of a Colony in placing immigrants on waste lands, and we sincerely hope that—even at the eleventh hour ns it were—efforts will be made to guard against the departure from Home for this Colony of unsuitable emigrants,