Letter+to+Governor+Grey

Dear Governor Grey 11/5/1860

I am writing to you because I am concerned about the impact of New Zealand and the negative effect it may be having. Immigrants are taking over towns, cutting down trees, building houses that take up most of the land and the population is increasing rapidly. We also don't want New Zealand to end up over populated with no scenery.

I am concerned about the number of native trees being cut down to build houses and farms on because the immigrants couldn't find the land to build on. Their plan is to cut down 320000 hectares of native bush. For instance in native trees lived native birds like Kiwis, and if they cut down the trees then they would destroy their habitats. Also because when tourist's come there wouldn't be any native forest to sight see. This is important because when New Zealand becomes more populated and crowded New Zealand will start looking like England; dirty and houses too close together.

My second concern is that Maori are losing too much land and have lost control of New Zealand. Immigrants are controlling Maori by giving them bad jobs and building towns. For instance they are making them stop their lifestyle chores for new hardworking jobs, like building houses, cutting down trees, doctors and more. This is important information because Maori are sick of Immigrants controlling them when they came to New Zealand before everyone else, and they are happy with what they were doing before this.

Thirdly, I am concerned about the health of Maori. They are getting bad diseases. Dunedin is on a par with the unhealthiest English towns. One of the diseases they get is scarlet fever. The death rate is 79.1 per 10000 was almost nine times the London average at this time. Wellington is also dangerously dirty. For example, In Christchurch 49 people have died from a disease called Typhoid. Please keep the population down and keep the native trees so the atmosphere isn't polluted.

My conclusion is that we don't want New Zealand to end up like England, polluted and crowded. So if you sop cutting down the native trees, Being unfair to the Maori and building houses close to each other, Then we may never have to end up like that. If people build more farms instead of houses then there will be more food. That is all I hope for you to do.

Your sincerely,

Kaitlyn Bews