N.Z. Labour is Strangling
p. 45 · Read in the full issue
Rarotonga
Prom a Special Correspondent
Rarotonga, Sept. 2.
ONE by one, old European residents of Rarotonga are leaving the island, escaping from the blanket pall of depression.
The withdrawal of the monthly San Francisco mail service, but more par ticularly the fruit purchase monopoly policy of the N.Z. Labour Government, and the “stand and deliver” theft of the personal rights of growers in their own products, have made life uncom fortable and unprofitable.
Immediately on the inauguration of this scheme, sacrificing growers, Euro pean and native, to the New Zealand middlemen, Mrs. Percy Brown sold her
property and departed. The estate, pur chased by the Seventh Day Adventist Mission, using the costless labour of con verts and with a headquarters to aid, may not feel the effects of the policy and loss of the steamer too deeply, but all others do.
The next to find it impossible to con tinue under the imposed conditions was Mr. R. McKegg, the able manager of the Cook Islands Trading Co., and he folded up his tent and went away.
Mr. J. Murray followed; and now Mr.
T. C. Worrall, better known as “Jimmy”, goes.
Twenty-eight years ago. Jimmy landed to assume a place as assistant in the store of A. B. Donald Ltd. In 1914, Jimmy was one of the first to depart for the Western front. A few years passed, and Jimmy was back with us again, badly wounded and prematurely aged. He established himself as a motor engineer for the then rapidly-increasing motor vehicles.
Success was his for a number of years, until want of money forced native own ers to choose between becoming their own engineers or of converting the chassis, etc., of their vehicles into horse drawn waggons. For several years he acted as motor engineer for the Ad ministration, but a stranger from New Zealand having been imported to live on Islands funds, Jimmy’s work in the freezer and on the Administration motor vehicles ceased. Jimmy has decided to try for employment in wider fields.
The policy of the N.Z. Labour Govern ment is slowly but surely garrotting Rarotonga. There is a vicious circle of
non-paying purchase price for bananas,
consequent non-planting, resultant in sufficient cargo for steamer, now reduc tion of monthly mail service to bi monthly.
EDITORIAL NOTE: It is only fair to say that there is another side to the Cook Islands picture. There are those who claim that the present Government controlled marketing scheme has been the salvation of the native growers. We shall publish, probably in next issue, an article by a resident of Mangaia, which says that the native orange-growers there are enjoying a period of un exampled prosperity.
Three old-timers of Rarotonga Public Works Department—Left to right: T. C. Worrall, for many years in charge of the freezer; Henry Williams, present officer in charge; Marcus Estall, planter and previously in charge of waterworks.