THE Wairarapa Age MORNING DAILY. MONDAY, FEBRUARY 14, 1910. MR ENOCK'S "NEW DOCTRINE.

Wairarapa Age, Volume XXXII, Issue 9718, 14 February 1910, Page 4

THE Wairarapa Age MORNING DAILY. MONDAY, FEBRUARY 14, 1910. MR ENOCK'S "NEW DOCTRINE.

j Believing that "trade and commerce j are insufficient as a means of livelihood for the British, and also inadequate as a basis of Imperial unity." the well-known traveller has conceived what he calls "a new doctrine." and, according to recent cables, it has just been propounded in a paper read before the Royal Society of Arts. The moat remarkable thing about the doctrine is that it should be presented as a new one. when, as a matter of fact, it is as old as the human race. Starting with the declaration that all the unoccupied I lands of the colonies are the property cf the people of the Empire, Mr Enock suggests "that each municipality in the United Kingdom should acquire an area cf free land in the oversea dominions to hold in perpetuity as a heritage for its people, developing it for their creating new sources of industry and revenue." "Acquire an area of free I land" is a neat euphemism for a [ word that was used to describe Mr Enock's "new doctrine" as far back as the time of Moses. It is quit e true that, as compared with other nations, Great Britain has treated her colonies with remarkable generosity, but it is a policy that in the long run has paid both parties. The Empire has handed over the land with the fulness thereof to the colonists to ; develop it in their own way and i enjoy the whole fruit of their enter- i

prise. No doubt it might have reserved proprietorial rights in the territory, but it did not do so, and on the strength of that agreement the work of colonial development was taken up. Mr Enock's new doctrine imphes that Great Britain should now repudiate its part of the bargain, and size the lands which the colonies I

have by the expenditure of energy, labour, and capital made valuable. Each municipality would have the right to acquire a free area of this land and turn it into a source of revenue for the alderman to play with. What would happen when more than one municipality wanted to acquire the same free area does not appear to have been explained. All Mr Enock's plan at present seems to provide for is a promiscuous scramble amongst antipodean municipal councillors for the inheritance of the colonist, if the colonies were treating the people of the Empire as trespassers and warning them off, there might be some excuse for the promulgation of this primitive doctrine. But, instead of that, they are only too anxious to assist people from Great Britain to come and settle on their unoccupied lands. Any ablebodied man in the United Kingdom who finds the place too cramped for his energies may have the whole- of our public domain to select from on exactly the same terms as the people here, whose labours in building up a prosperous State have made the lands desirable. Privately-owned lands are similarly open to them. In eitner case, all they have to do is pay the market price. If the municipalities know where there is any unoccupied land here that, under these honest conditions, can be turned into a source of revenue they can therefore ship their people to take possession of it to morrow, and they will be received with open irms. But that they should, as Mr Encck's plan would require to be done, confiscate the land on the plea that it was theirs before it was ours, is another thing.