POPULATION AND NO-LICENSE.

Wairarapa Age, Volume XXXII, Issue 10227, 2 May 1911, Page 5

POPULATION AND NO-LICENSE.

[To The. 'Editor.l Sir, — Do you not think that it is about time that the supporters of Mo-lioen&e gar« their attention to

I matters which are really vital to I prosperity of the Dominion ? ".What's wrong with. Masterton?" appearu to be about the sum total of the enquiries of some of your correspondents. "What's wrong with the population of (say), Wairarapa," to start with, would probably call for a greater display of intelligence if those persistent correspondents were called upon to answer that question. We are informed that Grey-town has made the magnificent advance in | population of about 100 (!) &ince last census. Are there 110 married people in Greytown? If so, where is the natural increase? Manriceville has suffered a decrease. Ask our local master of the public school for the increase in the number of scholars since he took over his duties, and I am sure that the increase wii* surprise your readers (and writers, too): Aii these enormous increases and decreases are due, of course, to License or No-license, according to some of | your correspondents- The trouble is that most people can only see the reverses or prosperity of the country through License or No-license glasses. They never seem to think that race-suicide, and the unsatisfied land hunger, may have something to do with. it. If there is not a natural I increase in population, to whom must | our tradesmen sell their goods? If | the land is still held, in large areas, I from whence are we to draw our yeo- ; men defenders?

' 'But a bold peasantry, their country's pride, /When once destroyed can never be supplied." Well, they haven't been supplied yet. Mr A. W. Hogg, MP., told us before last election that- the Government !had an instrument with which they were making the land 'that hot that the large landholder would be glad to sell it. I should [ think he would. Especially at the | increased figure which he gets for. it i from the Government wh?n he does | sell. If the holder had so increased j the value then it would only be fair j that he should receive/just compensation. But the general taxpayer, ' who pays his share of the interest oil ' loans, and who, in the great majority of cases, lives in a rented or. mortgaged house, pays his contribution to the roai,or railway which only increases the value of large landand pute up his (the rent-* payer's) rent. Well, if the graduated land tax is capable of being lapplied in such a manlier that it will ! compel the large landholders to rid of their land and sell it to the people at a reduced figure, why is there not a glut in the land market? Perhaps it has been applied to Bushy Park, and that is making the owners glad to sell at a reduced figure (?) The land at Bushy 'Park was held when the commission had decided that Matahiwi, Rangitumau, and other places were not wanted by the people. Anyhow, if those writers whose horizon is by License or No-license will take up this land ' question seriously, they will not use , their ink in'vain. I have been told that the medical fraternity have successfully traced the origin of the present outbreak of measles to No-lic-ence. I trust that such is not the case.— I am, etc., ; y FREEBOOTER.