The Daily News. WEDNESDAY, MAY 24, 1911. WANTED—A VOICE.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LIII, Issue 309, 24 May 1911, Page 4

The Daily News. WEDNESDAY, MAY 24, 1911. WANTED—A VOICE.

Happily, there is :i distinct recognition among press writers in New Zealand, fostered by the continued ''harping on the .same string" by a few of them, that population is going to count for more in the future history of New Zealand than alleged large, lustrous surpluses of cash. Although tho press generally sgems to have made up its mind at last that the essential need of New Zealand is. population, the State—meaning in this case its political servants —never refer to the matter. They confine themselves to vague figures, generally hurled forth as evidence of special political qualification. Some figures have been published lately that are not vague, and they have to do with a "surplus" a human surplus, a living, warm-blooded surplus. not being used as it should be. The position was put plainly enough at the Patriotic Club's dinner in London, when Mr. L. S. Amerv said the Empire had the vast majority of its white population crowded into 100,000 square miles at Home, and the minority scattered over six million square miles. He further remarked that neither Canada nor Australia could be considered safe until each had twenty million people. None of the speakers at that gathering of thinkers mentioned New Zealand, probably understanding the political sentiment of this countrv which leads to the supposition that one million folk are quite enough for a country almost as large as the inlands on which most of the Empire's white people live. The Imperial sentiment does not yet exist. Neither the | Britisher nor the oversea Britisher calls ilie Empire "Home.'' The Empire is as yet a series of parishes, each jealous of local rights and none having a truly Imperial ambition. While the Homeland remains uncomfortably crowded and the dominions dangerously empty, local views will dominate the "parishes." In theory, the immigrant, from the United Kingdom to the dominions merely shifts his camp from one part of the same territory to the other, -with the intention of making it stronger. Tn practice the immigrant takes his brain and bis muscle to the market which will pay him the highest value for it. irrespective of flag or sentiment. A Colonial Conference may decide --as the last one did—that all emigrants from the United Kingdom should go to the dominions, but. the conference did not prevent the flow of Britishers to the United States or the South American republics for all that. New Zealand is

rather proud of itself when it permits a selected few of its own ilesh and blood to land in tl)is country. It lias no policy of attraction, and it is frightened tiiat some roaring organisation or other will lie offended if the trickle gets out of a snail pace. The tremendous flow of British people to Canada is not because Canada is British, but because Canada wants people, and the people want money and land, comfort and an assurance of success. It is a matter of private and State organisation, keenness—the race for the dollars, if you like—but still a method of filling a void and strengthening the great Dominion in its nationhood. The whole of the countries where there is vacant territory are bidding for people, with one exception. New Zealand, the emptiest of the lot, is the exception. And the remedy? As far as New Zealand is concerned, part of the remedy is in the hands of its politicians, who must sooner or later drop party wrangling in an earnest whole-souled endeavor to people the country. The most vital point is in appealing to the people of the United Kingdom, because the Homeland has a huge population. The hammering in of the Imperial idea is insufficient. Decentralisation is a matter o ( f pocket, and not sentiment. The dominions are in commercial competition with other sparsely peopled lands for active flesh and blood. 'lt is a question of the highest bidder. We cannot attract population until we can compete in the offer of advantages with other countries. The advantages are here, but they are not cheap and are not offered. Sentiment drove the Pilgrim Fathers to America, and dollars kept them there to found a nation of startling vitality. The nation waxed until restrictions came—and then fought. The continued flow of new blood to America has made it the vital, aggressive, successful nation it is. It never slacked its invitations to new blood while it wanted new blood; and New Zealand, for unaccountable reasons, never issues any invitations, except grudgingly and to the instant accompaniment of class clamor and objection. And there is no public man with force enough to call for people, to clamor for the unsatisfied need, to see that this country, without peer in the world, is idling away its tremendous advantages for lack of people. We have made ourselves ridiculous at times by heated objection to the landing of a few skilled workers; we get uneasy about the conduct of New Zealanders on shipboard, and we see destitution for some poor suffering New Zealander. in the landing of a now navvy or an extra farm hand. The statesman who will alter all this for New Zealand has got to be .strong enough to do things without apologising to anybody. The usual method, when the secretary of some quite unimportant body attacks a Minister', is for the latter to enter into an apologetjc explanation, as if the salvation of his political soul depended on the first upstart who cared to gibe at him. Sir Joseph Ward, and that gifted Imperialist. Dr. Findlay, arc at Home in the breeding place of the British race. Nothing that these intellectual giants can do will be of as much service as arranging, for a constant stream of British people to this country. It is a business worthy of the genius of those two. our representatives.