Te Aroha AND Ohinemuri News. TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 16, 1909 THE NORTHERN TERRITORY OF AUSTRALIA.

Te Aroha News, Volume XXVII, Issue 4374, 16 February 1909, Page 2

Te Aroha AND Ohinemuri News.

TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 16, 1909 THE NORTHERN TERRITORY OF AUSTRALIA.

This above all —to thine own self be true, Ind it must follow as the night the day Thou cantt not then be false to any man Shakespeare.

In a splendidly lucid article by 0. A. Jeffries, which appears in the “Lone Hand” for February, the question of the great unexploited leagues of the Northern Territory of the Australian Continent is dealt with. And as the whole interest of the question of that territory’s development centres in the possibility of alien encroachment, the subject is one command* ing Dominion attention. This territory 523, 620 square miles in extent, cuts from the north of the continent sheer down into the heart of it, and, herein lies the danger of it, it is not really a part of the Commonwealth, except in name. It is really held by South Australia, in terms of the Royal Letters Patent of 1863 as a possession “ tentative temporary and terminable at the pleasure of the crown. " South Australia has made a noble attempt to rail it right through, but the attempt has been an over generous one The annual deficit upon the Northern Territory itself amounts to £143,000. To this burden South Australia has also the added load of £90,000 per annum upon the railway/ Hence she is naturally growing somewhat tired of bearing this heavy strain, and unless the Commonwealth Government can agree to the generous terms she offers them to take it over she may conceivably throw up the I whole thing and hand it back to the Imperial Government. As Mr C. A. Jeffries says “ Britain has an objectionable habit of handing over empty crown colonies to chartered companies to develop with black and tan labour, and once the territory reverted to the status of a crown colony it is almost certain that co’ored lalour would be imported in considerable numbers, and the Commonwealth find itself confronted with the awful problem which is keeping the United States citizens awake at nights. ” South Australia has already refused to sell her tenure of the Northern Territory to Syndicators who would not give her a guarantee as to abstaining from the introduction of coloured labour, though she was offered nearly three millions to do it. She now makes the commonwealth an offer on terms far less advantageous to herself. But, through itriguing on the part of certain financiers who want to exploit the Territory with coloured labour, and through the desire on the part of some of the other states to limit the operation of the Commonwealth the acceptance of the offer is delayed. But unless something is done, (and the assumption of the territory by the

commonwealth seems the best thing to be done,) this great icacii of land may be colonised ainid its vast solitudes on the quiet, by aliens stealing in unregarded, and then alien immigration will have attained the aspects of a “ situation ” in the Commonwealth.