DO IT NOW!

Sun (Auckland), Volume 1, Issue 20, 14 April 1927, Page 9

DO IT NOW!

Appeal to Minister NEW LANDS BOARD | “NOT MERELY ECONOMISTS” The board of inquiry into New Zealand land settlement promised by the Minister of Lands (Hon A. D. McLeod) should, in the opinion of farmers assembled in Auckland yesterday, be set up without delay. “ The order of reference should be as wide as possible, and the board should comprise other members of experience and judicial mind in addition to trained economists,” read the Minister in a telegram received today from the New Zealand Land Settlement and Development League, which body has been sitting in Auckland, under the presidency of MajorGeneral Sir Andrew Russell. The league offered the help of its organisation to Mr. McLeod toward a complete and thorough investigation of all possible avenues of exploitation. Expense should not be spared,, it was submitted, on such an important matter. SOUND LAND POLICY It was impressed on the Minister that the league was desirous of assisting the Government to follow a sound, intelligent, and progressive land policy, tending to the increase of wealth from the soil. Sir Andrew Russell bade the league “ God-speed ” on its long path of discovery. “Your work may prove of unsuspected value, not only to your country, but to your generation,” he told the committee at a well-attended public meeting in the Town Hall last night. The success of the West Australian group settlement scheme was emphasised by Mr. E. A. Ransom, M.P., Pahiatua, who commended this system of immigration settlement to the Government. “ Neither has any advantage been taken in New Zealand, as far as I am aware, of the Imperial Government financial proposals in connection with immigration to 'the Dominions,” he declared. Denmarks’ intensive farming methods, he said, had the advantage over New Zealand’s haphazard methods, despite the fact that this country had a better climate and superior soil. “We have no need to be downhearted. We do not even have to kill the pessimists as has been suggested,” declared the chairman of the Auckland Power Board, Mr. W. J. Holdsworth. “ Let us convert them to optimism ! ” (Applause.) THERE IS NO “PEACE!” A different view was taken by Mr. J. E. Makgill, however, who said: —- “It is all very well to call * Peace, peace,’ when there is no ‘peace.’ We have to face our difficulties, and solve them. The position, notwithstanding, is by no means hopeless.” Mr. C. M. Hume emphasised the value of herd-testing, and said this was one way in which New Zealand could immeasurably increase her wealth.