EMPIRE MIGRATION.

Press, Volume LXIII, Issue 19171, 30 November 1927, Page 11

EMPIRE MIGRATION.

TO THB EDITOR 01 THE PRESS. Sir,—A striking letter appeared some months ago in the London "Times" in which the writer, Mr Evelyn Wrench, referred with approval to an article contributed to "The Times" by General Booth, pointing out the failure of the Empire Settlement Act. In the course of his letter Mr Wrench quoted from "a friend of over twenty years' standing" in Canada, who said that the opinion of Canadians is that the Empire at present is only "playing with the, migration problem." The friend was perfectly right. We are playing with the migration problem. The present writer recently went for a train journey through the "Black Country" of the North of England. To eyes used; to more sparsely populated countries — the whole journey seemed to be through one huge city, so closely did town join to town, village to village. Think of the teeming cities of England and then reflect on the vast Continent of Australia, with a population of only some six millions; add together the populations of London, Liverpool, Manchester, and Birmingham, and then try to realise that the total nearly equals the population of Canada. Remember that the population of one Scottish city—Glasgow—almost equals the population of the whole of New Zealand. Then you will begin to wonder if there is not need, and a very pressing need, for a more equal distribution of the Empire's population. Consider these figures and ask yourself if we are developing our Imperial resources to tho uttermost. If you are honest there can be only one reply to such a question. Every day, as communications develop, "the world grows smaller, and countries are less able to live as isolated units. The nations of the world are rapidly being brought into closer touch, and a dog in the manger attitudo on the part of the British Empire becomes more and more impossible. We must either make the necessary effort and develop tho Empire ourselves or —but one'hesitates to speculate along that line. Anyhow, we have had enough 'of words. Now is the time for action. In deadly earnest, and with the old bulldog determination, we must set ourselves to solve this problem of Empire migration. The need is obvious. What can we do! In the first place we can stop talking nonsense. At a reeent conference of Migration Societies in England, Lord Lovat, Under-Secretary for State for the Dominions, talked dolefully of the unemployment problems of the Dominions. I venture to think that, at any given moment, there are in the Dominions more unemployables in jobs than there are unemployed out of jobs. The Mother .Country has a real unemployment problem, and it is up to the Dominions to help, not hinder the real solution of that problem, namely, migration. Then again the component parts of the Empire must get a fuller knowledge

of each other's problems, and this can best be done by an interchange of selected individuals for shorter or longer periods. Thanks to the efforts of the League of Empire, this is already being done in a small way, in the case of school teachers. Every year a small number of teachers from the Dominions exchange posts with teachers in England or in another Dominion. Why not extend the idea—business houses, for instance; or, most important of all, to the editorial staffs or' newspapers? Thus may the ties of Empire "be strengthened at small cost, and the facts at least be made known. Again, why should not the Churches exchange ministers? Think what it would mean to the overworked and depressed vicar of St. Saviour's, Slumdom, to spend a couple of breezy years ministering to the people of St. Saviour's-on-the-Prairie. With what new hope he would return to his old parish 1 And what a cheery influence would the vicar of St. Saviour's-on-the-Prairie be in Slumdom! How he would tell the poor slum dwellers of the new land of hope and prosperity overseas! And, knowing the conditions, he would only urge the right people to migrate. When their own vicar returned to Slumdom he, too, would know the conditions overseas, and his advice to intending migrants would be sound. Develop the idea further. By exchange of vicars a liaison would have been formed between the two parishes. Let the flow of migration follow the same channel. Thus would be removed two of the great obstacles to migration—the fear of the unknown, and the fear of loneliness. The very first migrant would know the vicar of his new parish, and subsequent migrants would rejoin old friends who had gone before them. Perhaps one of the great reasons for the Churches' comparative failure in these days is that they do not give their church members work to do. "Faith without works is vain." Here is a glorious work for the Churches in which laymen may take an active part—a temporal work, no doubt, but one which, carried out in the right spirit, might have great spiritual results. Granted that the Dominions wish to develop their own resources and thus strengthen the Empire—and this surely is the wish of all but a very small minority—it behoves us to indicate the type of migrants that is best suited for our needs. It is the -writer's firm opinion that the policy of demanding farm labourers only is wrong. The English farm labourer is conservative and unadaptable; arrived here he would think he knew all about his job, and be unwilling to learn. The town boy, on the other hand, is quick and adaptable and is ready to be taught. Further, in England the farm labourer is a disappearing race, but in the towns there are many boys who are sick or the streets and would welcome tue greater freedom of a country life in one of the Dominions. Then one must make it clear tnat the man who is a failure m England will equally be a failure in the Dominions. The good, steady workman will, however, improve his lot by migrating. Many industries can employ a low grade of labour, and thus free the more resourceful for the harder task of making their wav in a new country Ine conditions of the lowest grades of labour in England will thus be improved and thev will gradually rise in the social scale instead of, as at present, sinking further and furthest-ill they become a charge upon the State. And we do not only require labour. It is not fair to a young country to flood it with working men only. We want a due proportion of middle and upper-class families, who would bring with them culture and traditions, —things much needed in a new communitv. Further, they would bring capital, and capital is needed as wen as labour. , . . The above are oniv a few thoughts on the problem of Empire migration, and if thev oniv stimulate a little discussion thev will have served their purpose. The better distribution oftne white population of the Empire is a pressing problem and one which should be tackled in no half-hearted way Both in England and the Dominions we must get away from the P ar, *° pump and with wider vision try to see into the future as well as regara the present. Our forefathers founded a mightv Empire, and it is for us to enter into our heritage.—Yours, etc., Christdiurch, November 29th, 1927.