The Press THURSDAY, DECEMBER 13, 1945. Population

Press, Volume LXXXI, Issue 24748, 13 December 1945, Page 4

The Press THURSDAY, DECEMBER 13, 1945. Population

jOne of the Government's last acts of the session was to set up a select committee, including two Ministers, to sit during the recess and consider ways and means of increasing the population. It would be foolish to deny that such a committee can do any good. It would, for instance, do something quite useful if it were to survey the wide field of existing literature, official and unofficial, on population policy, present an interim report on the possible lines of action and the essential lines of inquiry opened up, and recommend a procedure. It might do more, though it is not easy to feel confident that this committee of laymen, in the course of the recess, can be expected to guide the Government safely to basic decisions upon population policy, the problems of which are formidable in extent and intricacy. Upon some of them, moreover, as in family allowances, the Government has newly written its answer into the Statute Book; and it will be surprising if the committee thinks itself called upon to examine and report on this (and related) legislation, reversing the constructive order, in which investigation and report would have helped to shape it. If the committee does take this view, of course, it will be fully justified. Whether it does or not, the Government will have provided an interesting example of irrational method: legislating first, then instituting the appropriate inquiry. The Government's object, however, may be a narrower one. One 'of the O.N.D. committees was said to be studying the possibilities of immigration.' If the select committee is primarily intended to carry on. and complete that work, it will have a better, though restricted, chance of presenting a report that points directly to action. Evidence may have been collected by means to which the Government has given no publicity. If not—and there has been no hint whatever to suggest it—the committee will be badly handicapped but still not helpless and not too late. The Australian Government's delegation to the Labour conference in Paris, which had been instructed to go on to investigate all aspects of,migration .policy in Britain and in Europe, satisfied itself (according to a London report, a week ago) that immigrants of "the best quality ever likely to "be available "—Danes, Belgians, Frenchmen, Netherlanders, Swiss, Norwegians, Swedes—were ready in thousands to move to Australia. They would be no less ready to move to New Zealand. Mr L. C. Haylen, M.P., the chairman of the delegation, described the interest taken in its inquiries as " astonish''ing". This measures the opportunity. But unless the Government has made similar inquiries oversea without a word of them at home, the committee will have no such results to work on as Mr Haylen is in a position to report. This handicap could still be overcome, however. The only insuperable one, if the Government imposes it, is its policy, which as presently defined would defer all but rigidly specialised immigration until employment is complete and the housing programme well advanced. This policy is inconsistent with the nature of the opportunity, a transitory one. As Europe is rehoused, as Europe reaches full employment, it will disappear. New Zealand's problem is to use this opportunity, while, it exists, to promote employment and to speed the housing programme. The Government's appointment of the select committee ought to mean that it is prepared to abandon or to modify this self-nullifying policy. If it does not mean that, then the committee is most likely to be useful in turning Parliament's attention to the broader issues of population policy and proposing appropriate means of investigation.