ALIEN IMMIGRATION.

Auckland Star, Volume XXXVI, Issue 34, 9 February 1905, Page 4

ALIEN IMMIGRATION.

At the meeting of the Trades and Labour Council held last night, the question of Asiatic immigration was brought up and discussed at some length. The Wellington Trades and Labour Council had written to the Auckland Council protesting against the influx of Chinese, and asking the cooperation of Auckland in urging Government to check it. It was pointed out that while 235 Chinese arrived in the colony in 1904, only 128 departed: while in the previous year 132 Chinese arrived and 124 departed. It is true that there are only 3000 Chinese in the colony, of whom not more than two or three score are women; so that the Celestial can hardly be said to have made any serious effort at settling in this country,. But wherever the Chinese have

come, they have shown tie capacity that they have exhibited in Australia and America xo monopolise such trades ac can be controlled by a body of workers able and willing to work very long hours for very small pay. We have no sympathy with the vulgar prejudice against the Chinaman as a being of inferior race. The Chinaman has many virtues, and if sanitary regulations and respect for English law are forced upon his attention, he compares not unfavourably with the average low class white worker. But we have to look at such questions from the broad vantage ground of public interest, and it cannot be denied that if the influx of Chinese assumed more serious propor- , tions it would inevitably bring in its train all the evils associated in. other i countries with the immigration, of aliens whose standard of comfort —not to mention sanitation or morals—falls far below that of the native population. On the disastrous consequences attending unrestricted alien immigration inanv volumes have already been written, and in England at the present time this question is regarded by the statesmen of the day as one of the most difficult problems*now engaging public attention. The cabled message published to-day referring to Lord RothscliildV. Jewish emigration scheme has more than indirect bearing on this subject. Lord Rothschild was one of the members of the Eoyal Commission on Alien Immigration which, after an elaborate examination of all the available social, industrial, and statistical evidence, presented its report iv 1903. and he has therefore had exceptional opportunities lor estimating the amount of harm inflicted on England in general and London in parlicular by the unrestricted influx of pauper "aliens. Lord Rothschild's scheme for the encouragement of Jewish emigration from the East End of London to Canada must be read as an attempt to counteract these evils by lessening the congestion produced in the metropolis by the hordes of immigrants who annually pour into it from every country in Europe- The Royal Commission to which we have referred dij not consider that there had been any serious displacement of British labour by aiiens. though the report stated tha.t the coudi tions under which the aliens worked b' East London were generally unhealthy and demoralising.- But there is ample evidence to show that to a very large extent the native population in East London is being rapidly superseded by foreigners. In 1902 no less than 33,000 foreigners arrived in London port, and Lhough thousands were sent back homo or emigrat.-ed, at least 10,000 remained. Mr J. Holt Schooling, the "Graphic" statistician, has lately shown that the foreign element in the population of East London is growing rapidly. Withhi the last 20 years the proportion of foreigners in Stepney alone has risen from C per cent, to IS per cent., and it if still constantly increasing. The same tendency is exhibited in most of the English centres of population in s> minor degree, and the proportion o1 foreigners per 10,000 inhabitants of Eag land and Wales has risen over 100 percent, within the last forty years- The results of this intlux is summed up by Major Evans Gordon in his standard work on "The Alien Immigrant." in til? following words: "Unrestricted immigration means extensive displacement of the English inhabitants: it implies rents for dwelling room that are prohibitively high for English workers, and it favours and maintains the sweating system, and tends to lower the standard of living almost indefinitely.'" In this favoured land we arc still a long way from tho condition of things in London,, where- i! is said that the finrijrners are taking up some 20 miles of new streets for their abodes every year. But the tendency of such movements of population is always the same, and if we wish to escape the attendant evils we must look to it that out workers shall not be subjected to unfair competition at the hands of any aliens content •with a lower wage or a lower standard of comfort, be they Oriental or European.