The Wairarapa Daily. TUESDAY, JULY 15, 1884. SETTLING LAND.

Wairarapa Daily Times, Volume 6, Issue 1736, 15 July 1884, Page 2

The Wairarapa Daily. TUESDAY, JULY 15, 1884.

SETTLING LAND.

Mr McCardle tried to make a little capital out of the Wairarapa Daily in hia nomination speech yesterday. He was virtuously indignant because we asserted that Pahiatua settlers had to borrow money for improvements. We also said that big landowners had to work on borrowed money, but he was not indignant about that, If we had known that Mr McCardle was so sensitive about borrowed money wo would not have gone to 'Pahiatua tor an illustration, as we have no wish to hurt his feelings, or those of the Puhiatua settlers, for among thetu we have friends. Perhaps he is only sensitive about Pahiatua! We could, if that be the case, find equally good illustrations in other localities. But the laud question is before the public, and we want to get at facts so that the present electoral contest may not be altogether barren. Mr McCardle admitted our case in a great measure when he said " if one scheme wont do try another." This we tako to mean that the existing scheme does nut work altogether well. Mr McCardle ia too fond of schemes, and in the multiplicity of his scheming he is apt to lose sight of the vital point which we sought to place before our readers. If we have hurt the feelings of Mr McCardle and his friends we apologise, and ask them to assibt us in resolving the real issuo on the land question, as it affects bush country. We hold that a man with a small capital who pays two pounds an acre for his land cannot find money for improvements, and for his periodical deferred payments, In old times the Provincial Government surveyed bush land and sold it at ten shillings an acre, We say that the Government now ought to survey bush land and open it up with a road at one pound per acre, and that if they do this it will pay a man with a small capital far better to purchase it at this price for cash than to give £2 per acre for it on deferred payments. We plead for cheap land: Mr McCardle contends for land on easy terms. In the long run settlers on deferred payments pay dear for their whistle. Demand for " cheap land" should be the cry at the present election, The man who buys cheaply has a fair start, but the man who purchases at the dear rates which now prevail, and which have prevailed for years past, does not have a fair start.