Nelson Evening Mail. WEDNESDAY, JANUARY 27, 1909. UNREGISTERED CHINESE IMMIGRATION.

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume XLIII, Issue XLIII, 27 January 1909, Page 2

Nelson Evening Mail. WEDNESDAY, JANUARY 27, 1909. UNREGISTERED CHINESE IMMIGRATION.

AN AUSTRALIAN PROBLEM. THE visit to Nelson in passing through to the West Coast by the organiser of the Anti-Asiatio League in New Zealand is calculated to arouse a measure of interest in the problem of the exclusion, or at least the very firm restriction of the immigration of Chinese. The laws in New Zealand are strict enough so far as they go, and it is to bo gathered that, either because of thero, or because of the greater attraction of Australia and fewer chances of detection there, the CrLne.se population of this Dominion is either at a standstill, or on the decrease. But it is beyond question that legislative and Customs vigilance is necessary, and the price of relative immunity, for in Australia the illegal increase of tiro Chinese influx, in the North and East especially, is attracting attention. • • • • « • Inquiries made by the Federal Government are reported to indicate that there is in operation a "well-organised system" for the introduction of Chinese into Australia — a system that has been working tor some time. The s'atement is practically verified unofficially by the observant, who note that apparently there are a good many mere young Chinese than beforo to be eeen in the cities, towns, and outskirts, and seemingly although immigration is diseucouraged the numbers visib'e exceed thoso acounted for by census returns. It is claimed by the New Zealuid ArtiAsiatic League that even here, by evasion, there are more Chinese than the Registrar-General'6 figures show. But the immediate issue is not " sut»nt cn this point so much as on the probable reflex action on New Zealand o! n-o-e cr less unchecked increase of unjcisus^d Chineso in Australia. There is nothing astonishing in the evasion of Customs and anti-imniigialion 'regulation? in Australia with its wide coast liue and its unpeopled regions. The country is very desirable from the Asiatic point of view, and the Chinese are a very astute people, with a remarkable gift for providing ways and means of expatriating tl Mr surplus |opulation. Commenting on tho suspected unsupervised immigration already referre dto, tho "Sydney Daily Telegraph" says that as some evasion «>f the restriction law probably must always be reckoned on, the result lo 1 e striven for as a matter of practical possibility is to minimise it, and the question now is whether that minimum is being exceeded. The experience of West Australia suggests that it is, since "a_ rough census is reported to show an increase of 600 or 700 this year, while since the last census the Customs Office only accounts for 238, or about half the year's alleged increase. Whatever may prove to be the accuracy or otherwise of the figures, that it a matter well worth investigation for one reason, because West Australia is one of tho States that aro dangerously close to the East ; for another, j because it and Queensland, which shares i that liability -with it and tha. Northern ] Territory, aro about the only States whose Chinese population tends to increase. The census of 1891 showed 917 Chinese in Weßt Australia, but ten years later the number had increased to 1569. In Queensland there had been an advance, though a very small one ; •■"t any difference on that eide becomes important when it is recalled that whereas, according to census returns, •nre were nearly 25,000 of these people in Victoria in 1861, there are little more than one-fourth that number now, while the New South Wales Chinese population, which was never much more than about half the .Victorian maximum, tends — according to the official statistics — to decline. As yat neither Australia nor New Zealand has cause to be uneasy with regard to the preponderance of aliens, Asiatic or European. The last Austra Han census showed that of the total ponulntinn no fewer than 77 per cont wero A".-trilian-born, n fa<+ which is rot wholly pleasant, of >-nurse, inasmuch a? it is explained by a deplorable lackof white immigration. Taking the native born and natives of the United Kingdom together, over 95 per cent were British. There was a total Asiatic population of 47,014, but that is scarcely moro than the Chinese have numbered in past years when the white people were much fewer, whereas the census showed only about 30,000 Chinese in the Commonwealth altogether. Tho Chinese thus represent, according to Customs returns—which may or may not bo altogether trustworthy in view of recent developments— less than one per cent of the Commonwealth population, while the Germans, who constitute the largest of all foreign elements, furnish a, proportion only slightly in excess, as they ex- 1 ceeded the total number of Chinese by , 10,000. '..«•• THe conviction ia growing in Australia that if - the slv invasion of th* Northe-n and Eastern areas closest tc Tho East and Far East by Asiatics, bv Chinese especially, is to be kept in check a moro vigorous policy of Europeou immigration mufl be maintained

No auch problem needs solution in New Zealand, but it jb beyond question that our "Yellow Peril" will increaseiri intensity in exact ration to the increase of unregistered Chines© immigration into Australia. It is not the poll-tixtd Celestial we have to fear, eo mu&h-as the stowaways and guild-assisted eculii of tue treaty ports, and their exclusion is ! desirable quite apart from issues of a j White Australasia policy. . I