Dependence

"We can make our own laws about everything else. If there is a law which New Zealand made in the past that we don't like we throw it out, and this is what we have been doing in the last two sessions.

"I can foresee the time when our financial dependence on New Zealand support will be cut down to an absolute minimum," he said. "When New Zealand was running the place they could spend the money. but now that we are running the place they give or lend us the money and we have the full right to spend it however we like."

Commenting on the Cook Islands' early history Mr. Henry said, "The missionaries thought more of their church than the islands and the people themselves. They destroyed most of the arts of the people.