One or two Points from the Evidence.

A. Wheeler, Poerua Settlement, Westland, examined:—

Mr. Anstey: "You say you have got good roads to your settlement?"—" Yes."

"Do you know what amount of loading was on that settlement?"—" Somewhere about £1000."

"Do you know if that amount has been spent?"—" Yes; and more!"

"You appear to have been more fortunate than some other districts?"—" I should advise them to get Dick Seddon for their Member."

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And yet the Government assert that they deal impartially with the needs of each district—when last year only £15,800 was spent out of the Public Works Fund on roads and bridges in the Auckland Road District, £12,700 in Hawke's Bay, £15,296 in Taranaki, and no less than £12,800 in the wilds of Westland, this amount not including the Goldfields roads vote, of which the West Coast usually gets one-half.

Outside of Westland, settlers don't seem to get much consideration from Mr. Seddon, though they have no difficulty in getting promises of the following kind, taken from the evidence of W. D. Humphreys, Land Commission, p. 937:—" When we attended the ballot over five years ago in Auckland, Mr. Seddon was present, and in the course of a short speech told us that we would have our roads in two years' time. This was naturally most cheering news to settlers about to go back to the back-blocks; but yet, here we are, over five years past since the ballot, and the majority of us have not even a six foot track." Dozens of similar instances could be quoted all over the country.

Percy Frederick James, examined:—

The Chairman: "What are you?"—" I am a prospective settler in this neighbourhood. I own 500 acres of freehold property in Queensland, and I have come to the colony recently to look for land."

"Is there any point you would like to bring before the Commission? "—"I am decidedly in favour of the freehold tenure."

"Are you acquainted with the terms of the lease-in-perpetuity?"—"I am, but I prefer the freehold. I am in quest of a freehold now, and unless I get an opportunity of securing land, with the right of ultimately getting the freehold, I shall not settle in New Zealand at all."

And there is ample evidence from other sources that farmers are leaving New Zealand for Canada and Tasmania and the Argentine.