Australian Control

The Devil

They Know

Australian Control “Not Wanted In New Hebrides”

Strong opposition by British and French alike would meet any move to replace the New Hebrides Con dominium by an Australian admin istration, writes a Britisher, with a lifetime of experience in the Group, in a letter to the editor. He says : DOES PIM advance the possibility that an Australian Govern ment interest in the New Heb rides would resolve all difficulties?

As a reader of PIM and its ex posures of Australia’s mishandling of its own Territories, I am certain that it will not be only the French here who will oppose Australian interference!

We know that the British Gov ernment would like to be disbur dened of its financial drain here, but we do not think that it will hand its burden to a country with little political stability—Manus and the eviction of US interests, the Indonesian bungling and Australia’s

contribution to the eviction of the Dutch there by a vocal Australian minority, etc.

No; the New Hebrides will want no part of a Government that has had countless opportunities of as

serting its influence wisely, but H never done so.

PIM relates at length the effoc of 40 years ago by Australian : terests in these Islands. Those e periences do not apply in to-daE

»rld, which has forgotten spheres influence, intellectual ties, and the nice trimmings which once me under the heading of Col ialism.

PlM’s attack on the French poli al background has no basis now, r any constructive effect. The ings to consider are the facts, stralia, long the largest supplier goods to the New Hebrides, and jrefore reaping most of that Ter iry’s earnings, has done nothing ■ this Group. France purchases r products: Australia takes only ; profits.

Australia’s economic interests are t the kind that PIM says they ;. Try selling New Hebrides copra Australia: or interesting Austra n capital in the Islands! jet Australia demonstrate her in est in a practical way—by set g up a development loan agency re. And do not confuse the issue showing that torrents of Aus lian capital have already flown 0 the New Hebrides in the past, comparison of French and Aus lian investments in boom year 1 depression would show that mce has contributed the larger ire. Let Australia give us a ;kle back of the torrent she has i from us, British and French. do not agree with your April respondent in all respects. He aks of the “extensive planta is” —but how many are new? ere has been virtually no plant of coconuts since 1939, and ce nts are our mainstay.

Ie says that the need for Aus lia to maintain a solicitor to :le land titles “really has passed” duch implies that the Australian d titles are settled and the land low available to interested pur sers. Well, we have yet to see r signboards on these lands inti ting that Britishers may buy m! Conversely, since January his year all French Government d has been for sale —even to British “aliens”. s that correspondent says, the mr situation is not as portrayed PIM. In fact, the labour shortage eased to such an extent that in ie cases the problem is non itent. Where a problem does ;t it can be traced to lack of jperation between traders and itation owners, plus the results the war-boom prices on the ives. If reasonable conditions provided there is plenty of »ur forthcoming. be real disease in the economic of the New Hebrides is the pe of capital. The big deals to do not concern new ventures, 7 are merely the settling of old ;. The fact now obvious is that increase in native copra is ctly proportional to the decrease European production. lis is a factor worth watching.

French are watching it. To ive another depression we must

diversify and modernise. Capital is needed. Some of the methods used are completely archaic and utterly wasteful of labour. Mechan isation is called for.

Capital flight from the New Heb rides to Australia and elsewhere is shameful. Before we are forced to surrender some of it for local use, let’s put our heads together and work to use it. There is no time for name-calling. We owe it to these Islands and to ourselves.

Let’s not wait for claims such as West Irian from others who are prepared to develop the Group. Let the local motto become “Work”, in stead of “En Principe” as it was be fore the recent Honiara Con ference.

t Inter-Island Rugby contests for Fiji, Tonga and Western Samoa for a South Pacific shield were sug gested by the president of the Samoan Rugby Union (Mr. E. Paul) during a visit to Fiji in May. A Fijian team arrived at Apia on May 25 and will return to Fiji on June 25. t Litchi nuts, grown extensively in China and India, have been intro duced into several other tropical and sub-tropical countries. The NSW Agriculture Dept, is now ex perimenting with varieties of trees from the University of Hawaii. The nuts are popular whether fresh or dried. The flesh tastes like muscatel grapes.