The Wairarapa Daily. FRIDAY, JULY 11, 1884. LAND SETTLEMENT.

Wairarapa Daily Times, Volume 6, Issue 1733, 11 July 1884, Page 2

The Wairarapa Daily. FRIDAY, JULY 11, 1884. LAND SETTLEMENT.

If Mr McCaudle is the prophet of the working man without capital, Mr Bunny is the champion of the small capitalist, Mr McCardle is great on deferred payments, and Mr Bunny is magnificent oh perpetual leasing, These political candidates differ somewhat on the land question, hut their plausible theories when tested by facts break down deplorably in oach instance. Mr Bunny at Carterton saidHe would endeavour to put the real position of affairs before them iu this matter. Supposing a man through industry and thrift to have saved up say £3OO, and this is the claas of peoplo the country wants as settlers, (Cheers). And say with that £3OO he desires to make a homo for himself and children, and purchases 300 acres from tho Government at £1 per acres the whole of his capital has gone in purchasing his title to the land and then he has to fall back uponjthe money lender to borrow money to stock and build a house and improve his land, and was it not strange, lie may be unable to pay up his mortgage or interest when due and have hi 3 property sold over his head, Now, the system of perpetual leasing did away with all that, The lease was put up to tender at the upset price of five per cent of the fee simple; that wa3, if the land cost one pound per acre the rent would be one shilling per acre per annum, A man under this lystem would get his—say 200 acres for £lO outlay in the first go off, and have the balance ot his capital to build and stock bis place, and he would not have to borrow at an exorbitant rate of interest,

This ideal picture was cheered by his audience, but when we look to see how it works in a, hona fide small farm settlement we find it is a failure. We will take Pahiatua as an example. This Paradise of Mr McOardle's has been settled on the deferred payment system, and men who went there have had the bulk of their little capitals available for making improvements, According to Mr Bunny's theory they would not have to borrow at exorbitant rates of interest, and they would not have to toil under the burden of heavy mortgages. Yet it is pretty generally known that they in many instances have already cast off the light yoke of the land office and sought that ogre which Mr Bum warns them from, " the moneylender," The fact is that even small capitalists find that improvements swallow up more money than they posssess. To make a living off their land they discover they have to convert it from a sjecies of Govern** went lease into a freehold and then mortgage it. At Pahiatua and in similar settlements money has to be borrowed for improvements mid as moneylenders will only make advances on freeholds the settler finds that he is compelled to turn it into a freehold or torsive it up. The deferred payment system so admirable in theory becomes in practice utterly useless to the settler who has to make his way in a bush settlement. As far as we can gather the deferred payment system and the political leasing system are but of little use in places like Pahiatua. Under either one or the other settlers find it necessary to resort to tho money-lenders to pay current rates of interest, Such places are pointed out as examples of improved land administration, while all the time the development thay have made is due to the advances of the money lenders. We are quite willing to see experiments tried in perpetual leasing and in selling land on deferred payments, but the result of past experience indicates that there is very little gain to be got from these new systems, and that after all the best thing the Government can do for a working settler is to sell him his land as cheaply as possible and on such terms that he can convert it readily into a freehold, Land, house, and stock cost money, and if a man has not got it he must borrow it, There is no royal road to a well stocked small farm; there is no " short cut" to an unencumbered homestead. The utmost a Government can do is to dispose of its wastelands at a low price, and give settlers good roads to them. Our land laws are liberal, and the Government havo made special arrangements to meet ihe wishes and wants of small capitalists and men without capital. Yet when the latter take up land, as in the case of Pahiatua, they find that the Government schemes do not suit them, and they place themselves at once in the hands of the money-lenders, whom they are supposed to keep at arm's length. We would like political

experts like Messrs, Bunny and McCaudle to show how working settlers can establish themselves on land without tho aid of the money lender, and if they cannot do so to candidly admit that, excepting at electioneering times, the money-lender is tho working settler's best friend, and helps tho lame dog over a style, whether the said lame dog be a small farm settler or a big runholder,