The Temuka Leader TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 8 1881.

Temuka Leader, Issue 351, 8 February 1881, Page 2

The Temuka Leader TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 8 1881.

I ________ j Excepting New Zealand, all the Ans- ' tralian Colonies are in a state of con- ! valesence. Sydney got a good start with its Industrial Exhibition. This, followed j hy a spirited prosecution of public works, I has carried them triumphantly over the i crisis. Tasmania lias put on a spurt, and ! is now going ahead at railway speed. A ; \igorous working of her valuable mines, coupled with a gloi’ious climate and a prolific soil, has enabled her to make a large export trade in preserved fruits, &c. Fiji lias set heartily to sugar manufacturing and other industries. • Adelaide, by liberal land laws and greater encouragement to her laboring population baa been able to cultivate a very large breadth of her agricnltmal lands. Melbourne, with her local woo! market, fresh meat companies and lastly, but not least, her world-wide Exhibition, is over the bad limes, and will be able to go on extending her railway system and her commerce. But what is New Zealand doing 1 Literally nothing but spending money in the North Island, and framing bungling railway tariffs for men with an ordinary amount of brains to laugh at. No doubt the root of the evil lies at the door of the first days of the settlement of the Colony, when her public men were weak enough to allow capitalists to acquire large tracts of the very best of the land for a nominal price. In America, the Yankee rulers adopted a very different policy. Instead of allowing a few to become large land owners at the expense of making those who were poor, and trusting to their hands, serfs, they framed such laws as prevented large capitalists becoming monopolists in land, consequently they had to seek another channel for the outlet of their rapidly-increasing wealth. The consequence was that large speculation g

in the centres of. population ltd to various enterprises, the result being the upstart of manufactures of all sorts. But in New Zealand the capitalists will embark in no enterprise, their sole aim is to secure large blocks of land, tirst by lending money, at enormousinterest, ultimately to collar the lot for their own use and to satisfy their morbid craving for landed property. All this has led to the present climax. A steady practical farmer can only secure a homestead of his own at an exceptional price, or the promise of a price which, in a large majority of cases he is unable to pay. This policy is still carried out by the large landholders. Take, for instance, the case of the liquidators in the Glasgow Bank swindle. The last report read, the company resolved to to defer placing their New Zealand estate in the market until more favorable prices could be obtained. Now a good part of these lands, of prime quality, were purchased at the Government price of £2 per acre ; yet the present holders have resolved to hold it until they can wring out of the practical man a profit of 500 per cent before they will part with it. Yet we have a Government who favors this proceeding by opposing a land tax. Consequently, so long ns they have no heavy taxes to pay, and can draw a good interest on the original outlay by sheep farming, they can afford to hold on. If a good stiff land tax were levied these land monopolists would very soon have to cave in. and working men would have a chance, as in the other Colonies, or America, of obtaining a bit of land at a fair value. Speaking of America, we need a large importation of the Yankee element. In our present case our Colonial Government is composed of men who were taken from their original dung-nill, .where they were born and ’•eared, and placed over gentlemen who had a very large knowledge of the world. Is it to be wondered at, therefore, that ihey are found unfit to grapple with the difficulties connected with a young Colony in a time of commercial distress. A certain class stirred up heaven and earth to get Mr Hall into power, and the most unwarrantable means were used to unseat Sir George Grey because he was to make the lands the peoples’ and not monopolists’. No means were spared to overthrow his Government. When fair means failed the most dishonorable intrigues and bribes were used to accomplish this end. Now, what is the remit ? Sir George Grey was turned out, and Hall and Rolleston and that home-drafted schemer, the Colonial Treasurer, hold the reins of power, and a sorry job they are making of it. Mr Hall has shown himself utterly incapable of grappling with the country’s troubles, or devising a remedy for any of the numerous ills under which she suffers. Mrßolleston seems incapable of excelling in anything excepting in cherishing a spirit of ambition and vindictiveness. Major Atkinson cares for nothing but Taranaki. Poor Mr Dick is simply a tool in their hands, while Mr Oliver has proved a failure. The only gentleman suited for better company could join in their silly aggrandising schemes lift longer—too honest for such a lot he [ was obliged to retire from it. Even the warmest friends of the present Conservative Government now admit that it was a mistake to give the control of public aflairs into such weak hands. Next session of Parliament will be a stormy one. Sir George Grey, with all his faults, was honest, and a gentleman, and had the ‘good of his fellow colonists and the Colony at heart. The present Govern ment look only to themselves and tlieii friends, regardless -whether the Colony sink oi swim. A change is urgently needed.