MAORIS AND CHINESE

Sun (Auckland), Volume III, Issue 713, 12 July 1929, Page 9

MAORIS AND CHINESE

CAUSE FOR ALARM CANVASSING FOR WOMEN That canvassing was being carried out in the Auckland Province for young Maori women to accept employment in Chinese market gardens was the remarkable statement made last evening at a meeting of Te Akarana Maori Association. A report was made to the meeting on the results of some of the inquiries made by the association in its efforts to eliminate the Asiatic menace. Representatives of several of the chief portions of the province attended the meeting. Reporting on the inquiries made. Mr. George Graham, the president, said that, in Asiatic cultivations near Auckland at the present time at least 54 young Maori women living in Chinese quarters. “In the past 12 months, we have had brought before our notice 11 delinit-' cases of unfortunate results where our young native women have consorted with Chinese/’ Air. Graham went on to say. Mr. Graham stated the concern of the investigators in the discovery that agents appeared to be visiting Maori homes in country districts, trying to induce young women to obtain employment with Chinese. ECONOMIC PRESSURE It was pointed out that the drift of young native women into such employment was due to some extent to economic pressure, but. there was now a sinister aspect in the efforts to induce the young women to leave their home settlements. Supporting the representations it has already made to the Government on the problem, the association decided that the only remedy was the complete prohibition of the Asiatic as an immigrant to New Zealand, and a policy tending to eliminate the Asiatic as an element in the Dominion’s population. To The Sun, Mr. Graham said that the names of men alleged to have carried out canvassing, which was simply a form of trafficking in the association’s opinion, were actually possessed. There was a real evil in AsiaticMaori mingling. The question was national, and the thoughtful section of the Maori race realised that a remedy could come about only with the co-operation of Europeans. The association’s efforts have been supported by complaints from leading natives in North Auckland, and recently, The Sun received a letter from the White New Zealand League in which advocacy for the movement was contained.