LAND FOR SERVICEMEN

Rotorua Morning Post, Issue 5301, 14 January 1947, Page 7

LAND FOR SERVICEMEN

MINISTER OF REHABILITATION REPLIES TO EDITOR "A leading article published in your paper of 4December 6 was re-t-ently broug'ht to my notice and, I fee'i, should be answered if only to clear up any misunderstanding which might have been created in the minds of some o-f your readers," writes the Minister of Rehabilitation, the Hon. C. F. Slcinner, to the editor. "The : article, which was entitled 'Land Ahead,' instanced the case of a young man whose efforts to secure a farm were, it was stated, thwarted by the enforcement of Section 51 of the Servicemen's Settlement and Land Saies Act. It is clear that the article was written without asking cognisance of the policy which I, as Minister of Lands and Rehabilitation, have so often made public. "I will thus repeat that I will not ' operate Section 51 of the Act so as ; to acquire a single unit property from an ex-serviceman purchaser irrespective of length or zone of service, if the ex-serviceman . is a bona : fide farmer, needs the land for his ■ rehabilitation and where there is no ' question of aggregation. Another ■ assurance I have often given and j which I now repeat is that if an i owner offers his farm property to an ex-serviceman (the nature o-f the service again being immaterial) and he is not satisfied with the price fixed by a Land Saies Committee, the vendor may withdraw from the transaction without being afraid of,: having the farm taken under Section j 51. "These two assurances have been fully kept. If the ex-serviceman to I whom you refer had been prevented on one occasion, let alone thrge, from buying a single-unit farm property in the interests of rehabilitation, then there must be undisclosed circumstances. I promise that if details of the case are submitted they will be immediately investigated. The question of financial assistance through the Rehabilitation Board is another matter. On pricrity grounds the ex- - serviceman would, on the face of it, not qualify at this stage; it is indqed not possible to say when homeservicemen can be offered such assistance on service grounds alone. "The third paragraph in your article is misleading and should be partly cleared up by the assurances I have repeated above. As for, de- . lays in financial adjustment, the fact that well over 3000 ex-servicemen have been settled on single unit free- j hold farm properties with rehabilitation assistance does not support the \ theory of hesitant vendors being : afraid to accept full cash values because of the ordinary legal processes invojved. . : "I infer that when you talk about j farmers wishing to sell to young men | of good repute in their district you are referring to ex-servicemen purchasei'S, If so, as the policy enunciated above makes clear, the vendor's ! freedom of choice of his purchaser is ' not interfered with and this cannot |

j act as a deterrent to selling to exservicemen. The possible effect of your article on servicemen settlement in your district is something that I cannot, as Minister, alford to overlook. I trust therefore that I have clarified the positio'n and in doing so have obviated some of the I misconceptions your article might otherwise have caused." I remember a few days later as we started on the long trek to the sea, over 1000 miles away, a cracked and almost unrecognisable voice rising above the plod of boots on the dusty road making some dry observation that ripped spontaneous cackles from the fatigue-drugged minds of j all who could hear. I can hear all | those quips now and I can see very | clearly that Bruce Bairnsfather j didn't have to look far to find Bill in the mud and slush of Flanders and i there were thousands of Cluelesses ' and Johnny Enzeds waiting for ; Colvin and Webber to immortalise ! them. A German could never make himself appear ridiculous either in his own nor anyone else's eyes. His whole upbringing and traiping had centred round the master race theory, and no master could be ridi- ' culous. A German could laugh at others' misfortunes and enjoy himself immensely, but he could never laugh at his own nor would he dream of ridiculing his own shortcomings. Thus was he defeated. In battle, as in every other sphere of life, the ultimate winner will always be the man who can truly assess the position as it actualljy exists and not as it is presented by higher authorities. The truest indication of this is the tetally dilferent manner in which Allied and German troops treatefi their own. particular brands of pro-paganda. The Allies knew that they were being fed with a lot of nonsense half the time, but it didn't really worry them. Gerry, on the other hand, was firmly eonvinced that Goebbels was the essence of truth. They had reason to believe him in the early days beeause he had no need to issue falsehoods and it -v^as not until the final year of war that they began to realise that propaganda was just propaganda. Tommy, on the other hand, never really worried about the B.B.C. Although he frequently didn't know whether he was coming or going, or winning or losing, he had a pretty fair idea whether things were faring well or ill. And if they fared ill, he could still laugh — Beeause after all there were a lot of very funny things to laugh at and the antics of the master race were sometimes the funniest things of all. &