Early records of unemployment in New Zealand are sketchy. Between 1865 and 1870 there were many references to unemployment, the position being at its worst in 1868. From 1870, with Vogel's vigorous public works' programme, the position improved, although even in the boom years of the 1870s with their strong demand for immigrant labour, there were problems of winter unemployment.

Economic depression again appeared in the late 1880s and by September 1888 it was estimated that there were several thousand persons unemployed throughout the country. At this time (and, indeed, until 1930) the only Government measure available for reducing unemployment was the provision of relief work for a limited number of men on public works and other Government projects. In 1888 the number of men on special unemployment relief works reached 727. After 1888 conditions again improved and by 1890 no men were employed on relief works. In June 1891 the Bureau of Industries (later, Labour Department) was established for the sole purpose of assisting unemployed persons to find work. In 1900, and in the years immediately following, there were increasingly frequent references to shortages of labour although a problem of seasonal unemployment continued. The Labour Department's records show that between 1892 and 1905 it placed some 2,000 to 3,000 unemployed workers in employment each year.

Depressed conditions accompanied by increasing unemployment occurred again in the years 1906 to 1911, the Labour Department's figure for unemployed workers assisted into employment in each year rising to over 10,000 for 1909 and remaining above 5,000 until after 1916 when wartime conditions began to reflect in labour shortages. Apart from a slight increase in 1920 and again in 1922, unemployment remained fairly constant and of relatively small dimensions from 1917 until 1926. For most of these years the number of persons assisted into employment by the Labour Department remained below 3,000, with a winter peak of less than 1,000 registered unemployed.

In 1927, however, the total of persons assisted into employment rose sharply to over 10,000, with a winter peak of 2,928 registered unemployed. Throughout the following summer the number of registered unemployed remained above 1,200 and reached a peak of 3,414 in June 1928. In October 1928 the Government, troubled by the increasing unemployment, set up a Committee to report on the problem. The Committee made its first report in August 1929 (see Appendix to Journals of the House of Representatives, H. 11B, 1929) just after registered unemployment had reached a new winter peak of 3,896. Until the end of September 1929 the usual downward movement set in, but was abruptly upset following a Government announcement in September that work would be offered to all unemployed registered with the Labour Department. The announcement induced some 4,000 additional registrations and brought unemployment to a fresh peak of 6,264 in mid October. The uptake of seasonal activities and the expansion of relief works reduced this figure to 1,242 in December 1929, but the cost of relief works had risen from some £256,000 in 1926–27 to some £915,000 in 1928–29.

In January 1930 the Committee on Unemployment made its second report to Government. Its two reports represented the first comprehensive studies of the unemployment problem. A considerable body of information was brought together although relatively little attention was given to the relationship between crests of unemployment and falling overseas prices for farm products. The Committee examined various measures which might create additional employment. As a result of the Committee's recommendations, the Unemployment Act 1930 was enacted. All male persons 20 years of age and over were required to register and, with some exceptions, to pay a levy of £1 10s. a year, payable quarterly. The proceeds of this levy went into an Unemployment Fund which was also subsidised from the Consolidated Fund. An Unemployment Board was appointed to assist in the administration of the Act and in particular to make arrangements with employers for the employment of unemployed persons, to promote the growth of industries, and to make recommendations for the sustenance allowances to be paid to unemployed persons. In conjunction with the Labour Department the Board was to operate labour exchanges known as Labour Bureaus. Initially, the maximum rates of sustenance were £1 1s. per week for each contributor to the Fund, plus 17s. 6d. per week for a dependent wife and 4s. per week each for dependent children.

In 1931 the Unemployment Act was amended. The levy was reduced to 5s. per quarter supplemented by a tax on earnings at a rate of 3d. in each pound, increased in 1932 to 1s. in each pound. The Unemployment Board was reconstituted and other changes were made in financial and administrative procedures. The levy was later abolished.

At the end of 1930 there was a sudden collapse in prices of exports, particularly wool, accompanied by an equally sudden and quite unforeseen increase in unemployment, viz.:

By September 1932 registered unemployed and persons on relief work exceeded 73,000. This figure did not again come below 50,000 until September 1936. By the middle of 1939 it had been reduced to below 20,000.

At the end of March 1931 there were 24,941 registered unemployed then being provided with part-time relief work and a further 13,087 without any work. At this time two relief work schemes were operating. Under the first of these schemes local authorities were subsidised to undertake maintenance, improvement, and development work which they would not otherwise have embarked upon – fencing, ditching, drainage works, land clearing, river-protection works, street formation, etc. – the Board subsidising such work on the basis of £2 for 1. The second scheme, on a pound-for-pound basis of subsidy, enabled private individuals to put in hand works mainly of similar types which would not otherwise have been undertaken. A third scheme of assistance had also operated as a stopgap for a brief period before Christmas 1930. From March 1931 onwards various further schemes were introduced, some as temporary measures and others of greater permanency. A main emphasis in the early schemes was on subsidised farm employment (on such work as bushfelling, scrub cutting, drainage, etc.), on afforestation, land reclamation, and farm settlement. In addition, various public works were commenced or expanded to provide employment with camp accommodation, mainly for single men, and a scheme for subsidising building and construction activities was introduced. By the end of 1933 there were 29,870 men in full-time employment subsidised by the Unemployment Board, and 37,870 men in receipt of part-time relief work or on sustenance allowances. The numbers of unemployed were reduced slowly in the following years, but the pattern of handling unemployment remained substantially the same until 1936. (See Reports of the Unemployment Board, H. 35, 1931, and following years.)

Following the change of Government at the end of 1935, the Unemployment Act was replaced by the Employment Promotion Act 1936, the Unemployment Board was abolished, the handling of unemployment was placed in the hands of a State Placement Service operating within the Labour Department, and sustenance and relief work rates were increased substantially. All relief camps were converted to standard works at standard full-time rates of pay. On 1 April 1939 the provisions of the Social Security Act 1938 became operative and unemployment benefit was placed on a new basis within the social security scheme as a payment which the worker was entitled to of right where he fulfilled the eligibility requirements. Registration for employment and the placement of workers in employment remained functions of the Labour Department.

During the war period, 1939–45, unemployment disappeared as a significant problem. In 1946 a National Employment Service was established under the Employment Act 1945 with the principal function of promoting and maintaining full employment. A year later this organisation was amalgamated with the Department of Labour. Throughout the postwar years the main feature of the employment situation has been acute labour shortage, particularly of skilled workers, rather than unemployment. From 1948 to 1955 the monthly average of disengaged persons registered for employment did not exceed 100. From 1955 to 1959 the figure increased until it reached 1,656 in July 1959. Since then it has again fallen. Even the peak figure in 1959 represented a negligible percentage of unemployment.

Statistics covering all economic activities are available in five-yearly census reports both by industries and by main occupational classes. Census classifications have changed considerably and a fully comparable series of statistics is not available. The following table based on census reports and using the most nearly comparable groupings nevertheless gives a broad indication of the way in which distribution of employment between different sectors of economic activity has changed.

Over this period the census labour force increased as follows:

Since 1947 comprehensive statistics of employment for most of the main fields of economic activity have been available from half-yearly returns furnished to the Labour Department by establishments employing two or more persons. Farming, fishing, hunting, trapping, and domestic employment in private households are the main exclusions. The statistics show the numbers actively engaged by industries, number of vacancies, turnover of labour, hours worked, and earnings. They are published in the Labour Department's quarterly Labour and Employment Gazette and in summary form in the Monthly Abstract of Statistics and the N.Z. Official Yearbook.

In April 1961, of a total of some 892,000 persons actively engaged in economic activities, 648,294 were covered as full-time employees or working proprietors in the half-yearly returns. The following information is taken from the April 1965 returns:

An article in the Labour and Employment Gazette of February 1965 analysed the regional distribution of employment. The employment districts of Whangarei, Auckland, Hamilton, Tauranga, Rotorua, and Gisborne (roughly the northern half of the North Island) had some 41 per cent of New Zealand's labour force. The remainder of the labour force was almost equally divided between the rest of the North Island and the South Island.

In his book State Experiments in New Zealand, W. Pember Reeves records the origin of the Department of Labour as follows: “In May 1891 a deputation from Wellington awaited on the Premier to urge greater measures of relief to the city unemployed. During the discussion it was suggested that the State should use its officials to furnish reports of employment openings in country districts. As a result of this suggestion the Labour Department began its work in June 1891”. Its first name, however, was the Bureau of Industries and it had a staff of one man, E. Tregear. Its name was changed to Department of Labour in 1892 when Pember Reeves was appointed the first Minister of Labour, and Tregear first Secretary of Labour. In 1893 the first Labour Department Act was passed defining the general duties and powers of the Department. It was to administer the labour laws, acquire and disseminate knowledge of occupations with a view to improving relations between employers and workers, and collect and publish information on industries and rates of wages.

The Labour Department Act was re-enacted in 1908 and again in 1954. Between these two dates some major changes took place in the scope and activities of the Department. Between 1930 and 1936 unemployment was handled by an independent Unemployment Board using the offices of the Department as registration bureaus. In 1936 the operations of the Board were transferred to an Employment Division of the Labour Department whose employment activities were strengthened and reconstituted as a specialised service known as the State Placement Service. With the outbreak of war in 1939 these employment activities shrank to negligible proportions and finally lapsed when a special division of the war-time National Service Department took over the control of all industrial manpower. At the end of the war, the Employment Act 1945 set up a National Employment Service to take over employment activities from the National Service Department as from 1 April 1946. The Labour Department had throughout continued to administer the Factories Act, Shops and Offices Act, Industrial Conciliation and Arbitration Act, and other industrial legislation. During the later war years and for a short time afterwards the Labour Department also administered trade-training schemes for demobilised servicemen. On 1 April 1947 the National Employment Service amalgamated with the Department of Labour, which resumed its full range of administration of matters concerning people at work.

The Labour Department Act 1954 was a new Act rather than a review and consolidation of the 1908 measure. The 1954 Act sets out the general functions of the Department as the promotion and maintenance of full employment, safe and healthy working conditions, good relationships between employers and workers, and the proper fulfilment by employers, workers, and other persons of obligations placed upon them by awards and industrial agreements and by the Acts, regulations, and orders administered by the Department. The Department is specifically empowered, inter alia, to provide a complete employment service; to make inspections; to collect and publish information on employment, unemployment, and wages; to make surveys and forecasts of employment; to establish, maintain, and operate hostels; to provide a home aid service; and to arrange for the selection, transport, and accommodation of immigrants. A Schedule to the Act lists 21 Acts which the Department is required to administer. In addition to labour legislation, the Department also administers legislation on weights and measures, on tenancy, and on national service registration.

Edward Tregear was Secretary of Labour from 1892 to 1912. Other holders of the office have been J. Lomas, 1912–13; F. W. Rowley, 1913–29; W. Newton, 1929–32; G. C. Godfrey, 1932–35; J. S. Hunter, 1935–39; H. E. Moston, 1939–46; H. L. Bockett, 1946–64; and H. Parsonage, 1965–. There have been considerably more changes in the office of Minister of Labour, those who have held office being W. P. Reeves, 1892–96; R. J. Seddon, 1896–1906; W. Hall-Jones, 1906; J. A. Millar, 1906–09; A. W. Hogg, 1909; J. A. Millar, 1909–12; G. Laurenson, 1912; W. F. Massey, 1912–20; W. H. Herries, 1920–21; G. J. Anderson, 1921–28; W. A. Veitch, 1928–30; S. G. Smith, 1930–31; A. Hamilton, 1931–35; H. T. Armstrong, 1935–38; P. C. Webb, 1938–46; J. O'Brien, 1946; A. McLagan, 1946–49; W. Sullivan, 1949–57; J. K. McAlpine, 1957; F. Hackett, 1957–60; T. P. Shand, 1960–.

(1866–1936).

Seventeenth Governor of New Zealand.

Lord Islington was born on 31 October 1866 at Ryde, Isle of Wight, the only son of Rear-Admiral J. B. Dickson by his first wife, Sarah Matilda, third daughter of Thomas Poynder of Hilmanston Manor, Wiltshire. He was educated at Harrow and Christ Church, Oxford, succeeding his greatuncle as Baronet in 1884, and in 1888 assuming the additional surname of Poynder. He represented North-west Wiltshire (1892–1910), first as a Conservative, but crossed the floor on the tariff issue in 1905 and joined the Liberal Party. On 30 September 1896 he married Anne Dundas, a grand-daughter of Lord Napier of Magdala. He served as A.D.C. to Lord Methuen in the Boer War, where he won his D.S.O. as a dispatch rider.

Islington was elevated to the peerage (27 April 1910) and appointed Governor of New Zealand on 4 May, assuming office on 22 June. He resigned his Governorship on 19 December 1912, to become chairman of the Royal Commission on Public Services in India (1912–14). In the House of Lords, he became Under-Secretary of State for Colonies (1914–15), and India (1916–18), and for a brief period in 1917–18 had sole charge of the India Office. He was chairman of the National Savings Committee (1920–26), which did much to popularise the scheme.

Lord Islington commanded great respect in the House of Lords where his powers as a debater were justly renowned. He died in London on 6 December 1936 when his titles became extinct.

by Bernard John Foster, M.A., Research Officer, Department of Internal Affairs, Wellington.

The Times (London), 8 Dec 1936 (Obit); Ibid., 11 Dec 1936.

Three tiny coral atolls comprise the Tokelau group –Fakaofo, Nukunono, and Atafu. They lie approximately 50 miles apart and 300 miles north of Western Samoa. Each atoll consists of a number of reefbound islets encircling a lagoon. The islets do not rise more than 15 ft above sea level and their total land area is four square miles. The average mean temperature is 82°F.

People

The Tokelauans are Polynesians who are culturally and linguistically linked to the Samoans, but their remote atoll way of life most closely approximates that of the northern Cook Islanders. The population at the census of 25 September 1961 was 1,860, 874 males and 986 females.

History and Government

The first European to visit the group is believed to have been Commodore Byron, RN, in 1765. The group became a British protectorate in 1877 and was annexed by Britain in 1916, being included with the Gilbert and Ellice Islands colony. New Zealand took over administration of the group in 1925 and in 1948 included it within the territorial boundaries of New Zealand; Tokelauans thereby became New Zealand citizens as well as British subjects. The group is administered by the High Commissioner for New Zealand in Western Samoa in his capacity of Administrator of the Tokelau Islands.

The basis of law in the group is the 1948 Tokelau Islands Act which preserves unrevoked legislation made by the Western Pacific High Commission prior to 1925 together with subsequent New Zealand regulations. Local government is controlled by the “faipule” on each island who is the chief Government representative. The faipule administers the law and presides over the local court. He is democratically elected for a term of three years and is assisted by the village mayor or “pulenu'u” who is in effect the principal executive official.

Social Conditions

A simple atoll existence consisting mainly of subsistence planting and fishing is centred around the family unit. Village affairs are looked after by a council of family elders. Human rights are protected by legislation as they are in New Zealand. Housing is of timber-framing covered by pandanus with gabled roofing.

Economy

The principal food crops of the almost entirely subsistence economy are coconuts, breadfruit, pawpaws, and bananas. All land is owned by the Tokelauan families according to their own custom.

Approximately once a quarter, a chartered vessel visits the atolls from Western Samoa to load their only exports, copra and plaited ware. Approximately 200 tons of copra are exported each year. Imports consist mainly of foodstuffs, kerosene, and tobacco.

New Zealand currency is used and expenditure is mainly devoted to health, education, and agriculture. The territory's economy is subsidised by the New Zealand Government by approximately £40,000 a year.

Transport and Communications

Apart from the quarterly trading visit from Western Samoa, the group's only connections with the outside world are by daily radio telegraphic schedules and an occasional RNZAF flying boat visit for urgent medical cases or to fly in Government officials.

Health

Normally an assistant medical officer resides on each atoll and he is assisted by Tokelauan nursing staff. Regular visits are made to the Group by medical officers of the Government of Western Samoa, and specialist services are made available by the New Zealand Government. Nutrition standards are as good as atoll conditions will permit. Filaria, skin diseases, and eye trouble are the major sicknesses but all are kept under control.

Education

Schooling, which is free and compulsory, is carried out by Tokelauan teachers in two Government primary schools, and by Roman Catholic European missionaries in the sole mission primary school. Selected students are sent to New Zealand, Western Samoa, and Fiji for higher education.

by Selwyn Digby Wilson, B.A., Department of Island Territories, Wellington.

Situated 19°s and 169 50'w, Niue is an elevated outcrop of emerged coral reefs, 100 square miles in area. The interior of the island is a saucer-shaped plateau about 220 ft above sea level. A second reef surrounds the plateau at about 90 ft above sea level and is nowhere more than half a mile wide. Apart from the rise from the lower to the upper terrace, there are no hills. A coral reef fringes the island at low tide immediately adjoining a precipitous and broken coastline. There is no lagoon between this reef and the coast. The island consists solely of limestone resting on a volcanic substructure of basalt rock. The residue of weathered limestone constitutes Niue soils which, although fertile, are not plentiful. The terrain is rocky and broken, and cultivation is accordingly difficult. Apart from cleared areas for roads and villages, Niue is entirely covered with light scrub or forest. Coconuts, whilst found throughout the island, grow mainly within 2 miles of the coast.

There are no running streams and no surface water but a well on the western coast provides fresh ground water.

There are no harbours on Niue. There is an open-sea anchorage at Alofi, the principal village, where a narrow channel has been cut into the fringing reef and a jetty erected.

Niue lies on the edge of the hurricane belt and high winds or hurricanes are likely to occur between December and March. On the whole, however, the climate is mild and equable. The mean annual temperature is 76·6 and the annual rainfall 79·4 in. Rainfall is generally well distributed over the year but occasional droughts occur in the dry season between April and November.

People

Niueans are Polynesians affiliated to the Tongans and the Samoans. There has been little intermarriage with Europeans because of the isolation of the island, but there is a local mixture of other Pacific races. The population at the most recent census (25 September 1961) was 4,864 – 2,404 males and 2,460 females. 4,311 were Niueans and 81 were Europeans. A high birthrate is balanced by the emigration to New Zealand of approximately 200 Niueans a year. Immigration into Niue is controlled by the Government of Niue.

Most Niueans are adherents of the London Missionary Society.

History and Government

The first European known to have visited Niue was Captain Cook who landed in 1774. European missionary visits date from 1830, the first resident European missionary, the Rev. W. G. Lawes, of the London Missionary Society, arriving in 1861. Christianity was introduced to the island mainly by Paulo, a Samoan teacher who arrived in 1849 after being trained by the London Missionary Society.

Niuean society is believed to have existed for more than 1,000 years; a kingly system existed until early in the twentieth century. The old form of Government was patriarchal, the “patus” or heads of families ruling, and electing their kings. Eleven June 1961 marked the sixtieth anniversary of Niue's annexation by New Zealand. (The Niuean people had applied to Queen Victoria in 1887, 1898, and 1899 for British protection and the island had been made a British protectorate in 1900.)

An Island Council with one representative for each village (and replacing the old island council nominated by the King) met for the first time in October 1901 and passed the island's first draft ordinances. The Cook Islands Act of 1915, brought into force in Niue on 1 April 1916, consolidated all the laws relating to Niue and, with its subsequent amendments, still forms the basis of the island's law. The Island Council was disbanded in 1959 and reconstituted as the Niue Island Assembly with wider powers of budgetary control. In 1962 the Assembly assumed complete control over all expenditure on the island.

A New Zealand Resident Commissioner, who is responsible to the Minister of Island Territories in Wellington, heads the executive government of Niue. He is President of the Assembly, which is elected by universal suffrage, and Chairman of the Assembly's Executive Committee. Ordinances passed by the Assembly require the Resident Commissioner's assent or that of the Governor-General of New Zealand.

Village government affairs are largely settled at weekly meetings of the village patus, led by the Assembly member and the village pastor. There is a High Court and a Native Land Court on Niue; the Resident Commissioner acts as Judge of both Courts.

Social Conditions

The family is the basis of the Niuean community. The head of the family, or patu, has a voice in village affairs. There is no tribal system or hereditary rank. Provisions relating to human rights which apply in New Zealand apply also to Niueans. The basic wage rate at 31 March 1965 was 1s. 11d. per hour for unskilled labour, with varying rates for skilled workers. The Government is the largest employer of labour but more than 90 per cent of able-bodied Niueans work as subsistence and export planters on their own land.

The standard of housing on Niue is rapidly improving as the Government's £172,000 housing scheme nears completion. The scheme, which was introduced after the almost total destruction of the island's housing by hurricanes in 1959 and 1960, provides for the erection of 750 new homes and 150 one-roomed portable units for elderly people. The houses, of coral concrete construction with asbestos roofing, are erected to approved designs by the people themselves, the materials being provided under £175 loans repayable over 12 years. By 31 March 1965, all of these new homes and old people's units had been erected and occupied.

Economy

Niue's economy is based predominantly on subsistence agriculture with a small but steady export trade of cash crops. Of the island's 64,900 acres, 8,000 are in coastal, light and heavy forest, and a further 50,000 acres are available for agriculture and partly in production. Practically all land is owned by the Niuean people in accordance with their old-established customs.

A traditional pattern of shifting agriculture is gradually being broken down through the extensive activities of the Agriculture Department. Niuean planters are being encouraged to develop small areas of their holdings with modern agricultural machinery and fertilisers loaned by the Department; production increases as high as 400 per cent have followed the introduction of intensive cultivation.

The principal subsistence crops are taro, yam, cassava, pawpaw, bananas, coconuts, and kumaras.

The principal exports are copra, bananas, kumaras, and plaited ware. The quantities and value of the principal items for 1964 were:

Imports in 1964 totalled £228,210, over 70 per cent coming from New Zealand.

Livestock is confined mainly to pigs and domestic fowls. There are a few cattle and horses on the island.

Revenue raised on Niue from exports, local taxation, customs duties, and the application of local Ordinances accounts for less than 15 per cent of the total expenditure. The deficit is made up by the New Zealand Government by three-yearly lump sum grants, as in the Cook Islands. Details of these grants between 1962 and 1965 are:

Receipts and expenditure between 1960 and 1965 were:

As in the Cook Islands, New Zealand currency is used on Niue. The Niue Post Office is also a sub-branch of the Auckland Branch of the Post Office Savings Bank.

A modified New Zealand Customs Tariff is in force.

Transport and Communications

Communications with Niue are limited. The Union Steam Ship Company's m.v. Tofua calls at the island once every four weeks, remaining for only one day. Fuel supplies are received from Fiji by sea approximately every three months. Ships anchor some chains off shore in the Alofi open roadstead, and cargo is worked by three launches and eight lighters through a narrow channel in the reef to a concrete jetty. There is no airfield or flying boat base on the island but flying boats can alight in Alofi Bay in emergencies if weather conditions are favourable.

The Government-owned radio station at Alofi maintains daily telegraphic schedules with New Zealand, Western Samoa, the Cook Islands, and Fiji for news, weather, and shipping reports. The equipment at the station includes a radio telephone for use in emergencies only.

Standard time on Niue is 23 hours behind New Zealand time.

Health

All medical, hospital, and dental facilities on Niue are provided by the Government, and the services are free to patients. A European Chief Medical Officer is assisted by a staff of five Niuean assistant medical officers, two Niuean assistant dental officers, and a Niuean nursing staff headed by a European matron. The Government hospital in Alofi has 28 general and 21 tuberculosis beds. Most of the buildings are modern, having been erected within the last five years. Modern medical and dental equipment is available, but occasional medical cases of a more serious nature requiring specialist treatment are sent to New Zealand for attention.

The birthrate per 1,000 population is over 40, and the death rate under 10. Serious disease is rare. Forty-five tuberculosis cases were under treatment in 1964 following a complete tuberculosis survey of the island; most of these were on home treatment. Filariasis and yaws are no longer prevalent and poliomyelitis and whooping cough are non-existent. Intestinal helminthiasis is present in just under 40 per cent of the population. The abundance of flies on the island, inadequate toilets, and a precarious water supply are considered to be the causes of the disease.

There is a high standard of ante- and post-natal supervision on the island, and the Health Department places special emphasis on child welfare activities.

Education

Education on Niue is free and compulsory between the ages of six and 14. All schools are owned and staffed by the Niue Government. There are seven Niuean primary schools and one post-primary school – the Niue High School just outside Alofi–which caters for selected pupils from Form 3 to Form 5 level. The Director of Education has a staff of approximately 100 teachers. School rolls at March 1965 totalled 1,574. The primary school curriculum is based broadly on the New Zealand curriculum but special emphasis is placed on agriculture, woodwork, sewing, weaving, health, and Niuean language and culture. English reading is introduced in the children's third year at school and, by the final two years at primary school, all teaching is in English.

The high school has five academic classes plus a special “homebuilders” class specialising in sewing, cookery, mothercraft, agriculture, and carpentry. Brighter high school students are selected to attend New Zealand high schools under the New Zealand Government Training Scheme. (In 1965 41 Niuean students were studying in New Zealand under this scheme.)

A small teachers' training centre in Alofi provides two-year training courses for Niuean teachers.

There are 15 islands in the Cook Group with a total land area of less than 100 square miles. They lie in an 850,000 square mile area extending from 8° south to almost 23° south, and from 156° west to 167° west. The islands can be divided into a northern and a southern group. The eight southern islands include two volcanic islands, Rarotonga and Aitutaki, four raised atolls of varying size and elevation (Mangaia, Mauke, Atiu, and Mitiaro), and two tiny coral atolls, Takutea and Manuae. The seven northern islands are all coral atolls – Penrhyn, Manihiki, Rakahanga, Pukapuka, Palmerston, Nassau, and Suwarrow.

The Southern Islands

Rarotonga (16,602 acres), the administrative centre and main port, is a circular island with a central volcanic basalt core rising to more than 2,000 ft, surrounded by a low lying alluvial and coral lowland half a mile wide. Beyond this is a shallow lagoon surrounded by a coral reef. The uncultivated interior is bush-clad and steep. The population lives on and cultivates the fertile coastal lowlands which have rich alluvial soils.

Aitutaki (4,461 acres) is an atoll-shaped volcanic island. The island lies at the north-western corner of a roughly triangular lagoon. Here again the people live on the coast.

Mangaia (12,700 acres), Mauke (4,552 acres), Atiu (6,654 acres), and Mitiaro (2,594 acres) have plateau-shaped interiors of rough coral which were originally lagoon floors. Low volcanic hills in varying stages of dissection lie in the middle of the islands. A plateau, up to a mile wide (the “makatea”), surrounds the interior. A fringing reef juts out from a jagged coastline and there is no surrounding lagoon.

Takutea and Manuae are small atolls (302 and 1,524 acres respectively) which are planted in coconuts and worked as plantations.

The Northern Islands

Penrhyn (2,432 acres), Manihiki (1,344 acres), Rakahanga (960 acres), Pukapuka (1,250 acres), Palmerston (1,000 acres), Nassau (300 acres), and Suwarrow (600 acres) are typical low-lying coral atolls with small “motus” on a reef surrounding an interior lagoon rich in fish. The soils are sandy and sparse and support mainly coconuts. The inhabitants live a simple subsistence existence.

The Cook Group lies within the hurricane belt but severe hurricanes are rare. The climate of the southern islands is mild and equable, the mean annual temperature being 75° and the annual rainfall about 85 in. There are streams on Rarotonga and Mangaia. The climate of the northern atolls is hot and, because of the porous nature of the soil and the absence of any surface water, water supplies are precarious.

People

The Cook Islands Maoris are Polynesians with similar language and customs to the New Zealand Maoris. The population of the group increased by a startling 10·1 per cent in the five years between the censuses of 1956 and 1961. The populations of the various islands at the most recent census (25 September 1961) were – Rarotonga 8,676, Aitutaki 2,582, Atiu 1,266, Mangaia 1,877, Mauke 785, Manihiki 1,006, Pukapuka 718, Rakahanga 319, Penrhyn 628, Mitiaro 307, Palmerston 86, Nassau 109, Manuae 18, and Suwarrow 1 – a total population of 18,378. Over 84 per cent of the total population live in the southern islands and more than 47 per cent of all Cook Islanders live on Rarotonga, where there is a population density of over 300 people to the square mile. The high birthrate of just under 50 per 1,000 of population in 1962 is not counterbalanced by an infant mortality rate of 48 per 1,000 live births, nor by emigration of Cook Islanders to New Zealand, which exceeds arrivals by approximately four to one. Hence there is a steadily increasing pressure on land in the Group which is acting as an urgent spur to intensified production. Emigration patterns in the Cook Islands (and Niue) continue to reveal a steady movement of population to New Zealand. The movement is naturally controlled by existing travel facilities and does not as yet raise any great problems in New Zealand. As Cook Islanders are New Zealand citizens, there are no restrictions on their entry to New Zealand.

All Cook Islanders are Christians, the great majority being adherents of the Cook Islands Christian Church which is a London Missionary Society body. There are also Roman Catholic, Seventh Day Adventist, and Latter Day Saints missions in the Group.

Progress to Internal Self-Government

Rarotonga was settled 27 generations ago by two chiefs and their people – Karika from Samoa, and Tangiia from Tahiti. Mangaia, Aitutaki, Atiu, Takutea, Mitiaro, and Manuae were discovered by Captain Cook in 1773. Rarotonga was visited by the Bounty in 1789. The crew of the Cumberland, commanded by Captain Goodenough, were the first Europeans to land on Rarotonga (1814). The Rev. John Williams and missionary teachers landed in 1823 from the Endeavour, establishing the first real contact on Rarotonga between European and Maori. Piecemeal discovery of the northern islands began with the Spanish discovery of Pukapuka in 1595 and Rakahanga in 1606. Palmerston was discovered in 1773, and Penrhyn in 1788. London Missionary Society missionaries were the predominant governors and law-makers in the Cook Islands until the 1890s. The southern islands were declared a British protectorate in 1888, and most of the northern group was annexed at the same time by British naval vessels. A British Resident was stationed in Rarotonga in 1890 and established island councils on each of the southern islands and a Federal Parliament in Rarotonga.

In June 1901 both the northern and the southern islands were included within the boundaries of New Zealand, following a petition by the chiefs of Rarotonga, Atiu, Mauke, and Mitiaro. The Federal Parliament was then abolished. Between 1901 and 1946, government in the Cook Islands was carried out by the Resident Commissioner of Rarotonga, resident agents under his control being stationed in most of the outer islands. Each island had its own Council presided over by the resident agent and, in the case of Rarotonga, by the Resident Commissioner. Since 1946 major steps have been taken with the aim of progressively encouraging responsible internal self-government. A Cook Islands Legislative Council was constituted in 1946. The Council met annually in Rarotonga and consisted of Maori representatives from most islands in the Group plus a majority of official members. The Council was largely an advisory body with no financial and limited legislative powers.

Following the preparation in 1954 of a programme for economic development in the Group (the Belshaw-Stace Report), a constitutional survey in 1956–57, and the introduction in 1956 of local income tax, an important amendment to the Cook Islands Act (1957) reconstituted the Legislative Council as a representative Legislative Assembly of the Cook Islands with increased legislative powers. There were 14 members elected by universal suffrage by the Maori electors of the various islands, seven members elected by the various island councils, one European member and four official members. As President, the Resident Commissioner had a casting but not a deliberate vote. The Assembly took over control of revenue raised within the Cook Islands. Local Justices of the Peace and village councils were provided for, and came into existence in 1960.

As the first of a series of steps along the road towards complete internal self-government, the Assembly assumed full authority over all revenue in 1962. In the same year an Executive Committee of the Assembly was established to exercise any powers relating to Government policy delegated to it by the Assembly or the Resident Commissioner. At its session in 1962, the Assembly declared internal self-government to be its aim for the Group. The Assembly emphasised that Cook Islanders wished to retain their New Zealand citizenship.

At its 1963 session the Assembly chose a Leader of Government Business and four other members to form a new Executive Committee or “shadow cabinet”, each member being allocated responsibility for certain Government Departments. It also considered a timetable for constitutional development. At their own request members of the Assembly were guided by three expert advisers who drew up a plan which was approved by the Assembly and the New Zealand Government. This provided for full internal self-government in 1965 and continued association with New Zealand, the Cook Islanders remaining New Zealand citizens. The new Legislative Assembly of 22 elected members is to have complete legislative autonomy. Executive government is to be controlled by a cabinet chosen from members of the Assembly and headed by a Premier. New Zealand will continue to conduct the external affairs of the Cook Islands and will continue to make three-yearly grants-in-aid to the Cook Islands budget. A New Zealand official will represent the Queen as Head of State and will also act as representative of the New Zealand Government in the Cook Islands. A Cook Islands Constitution Act was passed by the New Zealand Parliament in 1964 to provide the necessary machinery for these political changes, which will come into effect when the Cook Islands Assembly endorses the Constitution.

Social Conditions

The traditional Cook Islands Maori social structure has largely broken down, and today the family is the basis of Cook Islands society. Traditionally there were three chiefly ranks – the mataiapo and the rangatira or the heads of families who controlled family lands and public affairs, and above them the ariki, who were the highest chiefs in their own districts, selected from particular chiefly families. Occupiers of family lands formerly had various obligations towards these chiefs, but the old structure was greatly modified by church organisation, the advent of trade, and the individualisation of family lands. The three titles are still recognised and carry a limited amount of influence but they no longer form the basis of the social structure, which can now be said to be westernised. The principles of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights are recognised in the Group, and there is no discrimination between the rights of men and women, either under statute law or under Maori custom.

Labour and employment conditions vary from island to island. The northern islands support a basically subsistence existence, with copra providing a very limited cash crop. In the southern islands, subsistence agriculture is strongly bolstered by growing for export, and small secondary industries and shipping connections provide alternative employment opportunities. A single workers' union, the Cook Islands Industrial Union of Workers, covers all classes of workers in the Group. The basic wage rate is 14s. per eight-hour day for unskilled labour, with varying rates for skilled workers. The Cook Islands Government is the largest employer in the Group. About three-quarters of the male working population work on their own plantations.

The Government's Social Development Department concentrates on community development activities, with the aims of improving good relationships between the people and the Government, raising standards of living, and promoting opportunities for leadership and cooperation. The home education of women, adult education, youth clubs, and a housing loan scheme are important aspects of this work. The standard of housing in the Group is improving under the impetus of housing schemes sponsored by the Government. A Housing Improvement Board administers the £150,000 housing loan scheme. Northern group housing is predominantly of the thatch-weave (“kikau”) type, but in the southern islands construction with permanent materials is more widespread.

Economy

The Cook Islands economy is steadily becoming more stable with increasing emphasis on an export trade of cash crops from the southern islands, which export citrus fruit (oranges, tangerines, mandarins, and grapefruit), tomatoes, bananas, pineapples, coffee, and copra. Two clothing factories and one jewellery factory in Rarotonga account for slightly under £200,000 worth of exports a year. The sole exports from the sandy northern islands are copra and mother-of-pearl shell (from the Manihiki and Penrhyn lagoons). In 1961 a commercial fruit canning factory was opened in Rarotonga. The first year's success of this venture gave a return of slightly under £100,000. Annual production is now approximately 640,000 gallons of fruit juice returning over £390,000.

Principal subsistence crops in the Group are coconuts and fish, supplemented by small quantities of taro and bananas in the northern islands, and by coconuts, bananas, manioc, and taro in the southern islands. Bread is baked on all islands.

The Cook Islands Department of Agriculture is pursuing a policy of experimental and extension work in the fertile southern islands, aimed at strengthening the Group's agricultural export production. Emphasis over past years has been placed on a citrus replanting scheme and citrus exports now account for over 25 per cent of the total exports. The Department is now diversifying the economy, and is concentrating on the improvement of copra, coffee, and pineapple production as well as experimenting with peanut trials.

There are 70 cooperative societies in the Cook Islands, and over one-third are on Rarotonga. A Government Department of Cooperation registers, guides, and audits the societies and also runs a Cooperative Bank to help to consolidate the cooperative movement. The Bank turnover is approximately £150,000 a year.

The Cook Islands Legislative Assembly has complete control of the finances of the Group. Local revenue is raised from income, wharfage, road and sales tax receipts, exports, customs duties, and the application of local ordinances. Local revenue accounts for approximately 17 per cent of the total expenditure. The deficit is made up by the New Zealand Government by three-year lump sum grants, which are paid to the Cook Islands Legislative Assembly and subject to the full budgetary control of the Assembly. Details of these grants between 1962 and 1965 are:

Receipts and expenditure between 1960 and 1965 were:

New Zealand currency is used in the Cook Islands. There are no trading banks but the Cook Islands Post Office is a sub-branch of the Auckland branch of the Post Office Savings Bank.

A modified New Zealand customs tariff is in force. Imports in 1964 totalled £1,502,659, 70 per cent coming from New Zealand.

Transport and Communications

Transport between the islands of the Group has always been a problem because of the distances involved. The Department of Island Territories runs a 2,750-ton, 13-knot motor vessel, the Moana Roa. Sailings between Auckland and Rarotonga are generally at three- to four-weekly intervals and calls are made at other southern group islands when cargoes are offering. Matson liners call at Rarotonga at three-weekly intervals, mainly for passengers. Trans-Pacific freighters also visit Rarotonga when cargo is available, and cruise ships, mission vessels, and yachts make occasional calls there. There is no good harbour in any of the islands of the Group. Vessels anchor off the reef in an open roadstead at Rarotonga and usually cruise up and down outside the reef at the other islands during loading and unloading. Rarotonga in the south and Penrhyn in the north afford the only anchorages within lagoons for small vessels.

Small motor vessels ply between the islands of the Group carrying inter-island passengers and cargo. Communications were improved from 1961 when the New Zealand Government offered to subsidise ship owners trading in the Cook Islands. The subsidy is paid to owners of vessels which are maintained to certain classified standards and which are available for voyages within the Group as requested by the Government. Three classified vessels now provide what is probably the best internal shipping service the Group has had for many years.

Serviceable airstrips are in use in Rarotonga, Aitutaki, and Penrhyn and there is also a seaplane base at Aitutaki. Polynesian Airlines make a fortnightly call at Rarotonga, from Western Samoa. RNZAF and CAA aircraft visit the Group periodically. Rarotonga (with 400 subscribers) and Aitutaki are the only two islands with telephone facilities.

A Government radio station at Rarotonga has links with New Zealand, Western Samoa, Fiji, and 12 substations in the outer Cook Islands. Radio Rarotonga (ZK1ZA), a Social Development Department venture, broadcasts music and spoken-word programmes to the Group for approximately 20 hours a week. There is a commercial radio telephone service.

Health

All health and dental facilities are provided free by the Government and a chief medical officer controls both remedial and public health work in the Group. He is assisted by a staff of three medical officers and one dental officer, 16 Cook Islands assistant medical officers, and three assistant dental officers, and by a local nursing staff, headed by a European matron and sisters. The Rarotonga Hospital has 57 beds. There is also a 70-bed tuberculosis sanatorium on Rarotonga. There are cottage-type hospitals on Aitutaki, Mangaia, Atiu, Manihiki, Pukapuka, and Penrhyn and the remainder of the islands have dispensaries. All the larger islands have resident assistant medical officers and the smaller islands, dispensers.

The general health of Cook Islanders is good. The birthrate per 1,000 population is over 40, and the deathrate below 10. Tuberculosis is the only prevalent disease. Although one in every 100 persons is receiving treatment for this disease, 75 per cent of the cases can be treated at home. There is a mass miniature radiography unit and BCG vaccine is widely used. A filariasis control scheme is being carried out in the outer islands with excellent results by a medical officer of the New Zealand Medical Research Council. The entire population of the Group has been immunised from poliomyelitis with oral Sabin vaccine. Yaws and leprosy are under control and are no longer serious.

Special emphasis has been placed on child welfare and maternity services and on public health work during recent years. The Group's infant mortality rate is below 50 per 1,000 live births, and there are over 30 child welfare clinics on Rarotonga.

Education

Education in the Group is free and compulsory between the ages of six and 14. The Government provides schooling in all permanently inhabited islands and villages. There are 24 Government primary schools (total rolls in 1965–4,490), one post-primary school (Tereora College–448 pupils), three junior high schools (at Aitutaki, Atiu, and Mangaia), and one teachers' training college (167 students). In addition, there are six independent Mission schools in five islands (total roll 397).

The Director of Education controls a staff of over 550 teachers and student teachers. The school curriculum is based broadly on the New Zealand curriculum, with emphasis on subjects related to the special needs of the Cook Islands. Emphasis is given to woodwork, homecrafts, and agriculture as well as to academic subjects. English is rather naturally the Cook Islanders' most difficult subject.

The New Zealand Government Training Scheme continues to be the most important means of educating selected Cook Islanders to New Zealand standards for varied positions of responsibility in the islands. Over 100 Cook Islanders are receiving training in New Zealand under the scheme, in schools, universities, hospitals, training colleges, and trade apprenticeships.

The main educational problem being faced by the Cook Islands Government is a shortage of trained teachers to cater for the rapidly increasing school rolls.

New Zealand is responsible for the administration of three South Pacific territories – Niue Island, the Tokelau Islands, and, until 1965, the Cook Islands. The Minister of Island Territories is charged with the administration of the territories through the Resident Commissioners of the Cook Islands (stationed at Rarotonga) and Niue, and the Administrator of the Tokelau Islands (stationed in Apia, Western Samoa). The Department of Island Territories, with offices in Wellington and Auckland, assists in the coordination of the formulation and development of New Zealand's policy in the territories. It also transmits advice and assistance from New Zealand Government Departments to the territorial governments, runs the G.m.v. Moana Roa, and acts as purchasing agent for the territorial governments.

All islanders born in New Zealand territories are British subjects and New Zealand citizens. The total population in the islands is slightly over 25,000, and a further 8,000 Cook, Niue, and Tokelau Islanders are living in New Zealand.

(1891– ).

Aviation administrator.

A new biography of Isitt, Leonard Monk appears in the Dictionary of New Zealand Biography on this site.

Leonard Monk Isitt was born in Christchurch on 27 July 1891, the son of the Hon. Leonard Monk Isitt, M.L.C., and was educated at Mostyn House, Cheshire, and Christchurch Boys' High School. For a brief period he was in business, but joined the New Zealand Forces in 1915. He transferred to the RAF the following year and became a flying instructor. Qualifying as a commercial navigator and pilot he returned to the New Zealand Air Force and took command of Wigram Aerodrome in 1923. Again followed a short term with the RAF and as Liaison Officer with the Air Ministry. He then took over the command at Hobsonville Air Base. Steady promotion saw him a Group Captain in 1938, followed in 1940 by a course of study at the Imperial Defence College. With the outbreak of war he represented New Zealand in the Empire Air Training Scheme in Canada. He was concerned with the purchasing of equipment and supplies in North America, was on the staff of the New Zealand Ministry in Washington in 1942, and represented New Zealand at conferences in London, Washington, and Ottawa. Before returning to New Zealand in 1943 he established the RNZAF Headquarters in London. In New Zealand he became Chief of the Air Staff with the rank of Air Vice Marshal, retiring in 1946. He retained his interest in aviation by sponsoring the establishment of Tasman Empire Airways of which he became chairman in 1947. He was made C.B.E., 1940, and K.B.E., 1945.

(1854–1937).

Methodist minister, temperance leader, politician.

A new biography of Isitt, Leonard Monk appears in the Dictionary of New Zealand Biography on this site.

Leonard Monk Isitt was born in a Methodist home in Bedford, England; his father died when he was two and his mother when he was 12. He was educated at Clevedon Methodist College, Northampton, and, afterwards, at the age of 15, joined a drapery firm. He came out to New Zealand to get experience and also to join his brother Francis Whitmore who was a Methodist minister at Balclutha. Isitt worked in the warehouse of Ross and Glendining at Dunedin, but the urge to enter the Methodist ministry became stronger, and he was sent to a Home Mission Station at Lawrence. Here occurred an incident which influenced his subsequent career. Called upon to conduct the burial service of a man who had died of alcoholic poisoning, whose body was hurried by a drunken driver to a grave left half-dug by a drunken gravedigger, Isitt scathingly denounced the publicans present at the funeral and set his whole energies to fight the drink evil.

Isitt became a minister in 1876 and was ordained in 1881. He was stationed successively at Auckland, Masterton, Wellington, Christchurch and, finally, in 1889 at Sydenham, where the drink evil was seen in its most sordid aspect. It was largely a working-class district, with grimy little cottages jammed into the smallest possible sections, many of them blackened with smoke from the railway yards. He met T. E. Taylor, a kindred spirit, and together they determined to fight for legislative prohibition. The campaign followed two chief lines of attack. One was propaganda spread by means of a paper, The Prohibitionist, which, although started for local consumption, was soon circulated throughout New Zealand under the name of the Vanguard. His brother Francis edited the paper. This propaganda was aided by one of the most powerful speaking campaigns ever carried out in New Zealand. Isitt had a natural eloquence which, fed by his burning enthusiasm for his cause, made him an orator of a type probably unequalled in New Zealand. He ruined a good singing voice by his efforts. Dr C. F. Aked described him in these words: “When did we hear such speaking as his? Clear pure Saxon, not a word misplaced, not a sentence which could be improved; every phrase a point; every point sent home; massive sentences falling like the strokes of a sledgehammer”. The Methodist Conference released him from his usual work to concentrate on his campaign.

Isitt's second line of attack was to gain control of the Licensing Committee and refuse licences to all Sydenham hotels. The first attempt in 1890 failed, but the next election resulted in all five members elected being Prohibitionists. The publicans, however, took a test case to Court and Judge Denniston ruled that the Licensing Committee had acted beyond its powers, which should be used in a judicial and impartial manner, not as an instrument of a campaign. The Court of Appeal unanimously upheld him.

Isitt made four speaking tours in England at the invitation of the United Kingdom Alliance. When T. E. Taylor died in 1911, he succeeded him as member of Parliament for Sydenham, and held the seat until 1925 when he was appointed to the Legislative Council. He worked hard to get the Local Option Bill through Parliament and was successful. Bible in Schools was another cause he worked for and he was prominent in the Boy Scout movement. He was a governor of Canterbury College and was vice-president of the Methodist Centenary Conference in 1922. He founded the firm of L. M. Isitt and Co., booksellers (Christ-church), and was its managing director.

In 1881 he married Agnes, daughter of John Scott Caverhill. One son, Sir Leonard Isitt, was head of the New Zealand Air Staff and another was killed in the 1914–18 war.

Isitt died at Lewisham Hospital on 29 July 1937, aged 83.

by George Ranald Macdonald, Retired Farmer, Kaiapoi R.D.

• Methodist Archives, Christchurch Connexional Office
• Weekly Press (Christchurch), 26 Jul 1894
• Press (Christchurch), 30 Jul 1937 (Obit)
• N.Z. Methodist Times, 14 Aug 1937 (Obit)
• Evening Post, 29 Jul 1937 (Obit).