IMMIGRANTS COMPLAIN.

Taranaki Daily News, 23 July 1920, Page 4

IMMIGRANTS COMPLAIN.

CONDITIONS ON SHIP CRITICISED. A' GRAVE THREAT! By Telegraph.—Press Association. Dunedin, Last-Night. Some of the passengers who have just arrived in New Zealand by the Mahana, do not subscribe to the statement 'that the voyage of the steamer was uneventful and devoid of any outstanding incidents. As a matter of fact, it is stated that a party of passengers have conferred, and have decided to forward a caustic account of the conditions under which they say they lived on the voyage to New Zealand, to two of the leading English newspapers. If there is' any truth in the story that the account of the voyage i$ to be published at Home, and if the allegations that living conditions on the vessel wisre far from what they should have been, are correct, it is quite apparent that it; will have a detrimental effect on future immigration to the Dominion. >,, It is alleged that the* Mahana was overcrowded, that some, passengers took the opportunity, when she made-her first port of Call in America, to go ashore and lay m a stock of provisions to help-them over the remainder of. the voyage, and that the cooking.of the meat was carried out in a careless manner. It would not be safe to publish one of the allegations made unless it could be proved to be correct beyond a shadow of doubt: If however, there is a scintilla of truth in this particular allegation it should certainly be the basis of a searching inquiry by the authorities.