BOY IMMIGRANTS

Dominion, Volume 16, Issue 165, 31 March 1923, Page 6

BOY IMMIGRANTS

FOR AUSTRALIA AND NEW ZEALAND Y.M.C.A. COMMISSIONER ARRIVES AND EXPLAINS NEW SCHEME 1 A new migration movement, for the selection and transport to the Dominions of boys from the United Kingdom, which has passed tho preliminary stages In Australia, is the subject of an informative interview with a special commissioner from the Y.M.C.A., London, who is now in Wellington.

Mr. Cyril Bavin, resident general secretary, Migration Department, National Council of the Young Men’s Christian Association, set out from London some months ago, on a mission to Canada, Australia, and New Zealand, with certain proposals, designed to enlist the co-operation of the churches and other bodies in the migration movement. He is no stranger to Australia or New Zealand, for ho has spent some years in both countries. He was here in his early youth, when the Rev. T. Rainsford Bavin, his father, ministered to the congregation of the Methodist Church at Wellington. His brother, Mr. Thomas Bavin, is at present Attorney-General of New South Wales. “I wish to emphasise particularly,” said the visitor yesterday, “that the work I am heje to do is with the full approbation of the Immigration Department. I have had a long interview with the Under-Secretary, who realises that, if the proposals I am here to make to the churches are acceptable, they will greatly facilitate his own work and fall into line with his own policy. “There are 750.000 boys leaving school every year at Home, said Mr. Bavin. “Among them is the finest material for., prospective New Zealanders. We are working in close co-opera-tion with the Overseas Settlement Committee, and both of us would like to r.«e something more definite done by i\ew Zealand to promote boy m'gration from Britain. We wanted 6000 boys for South Australia, and had 80,000 applicants within four lf we can get the assurance for the parents that the boys are going out under proper care and control, it will make all the difference in the type of boy sentout. Training Farms In Australia. Mr. Bavin has closely investigated the Australian schemes for absorbing boy migrants. Three-quarters of the number sent to tho Australian States have come through the Y.M.C.A. at Home. In New South Wales, under what is known as ths Dreadnought Scheme, there are four training, farms --at Scheyville, Temora, Wagga Wagga and Grafijon—in centres that have been admirably chosen to embrace the different types of crops grown in the country, as well as pastoral and dairying pursuits. Taking Scheyville as a sample, there is accommodation for 80 boys. Tho course is Three months. During that time the Government does not aspire to give the boys a finished training, but a practical insight into the rudiments, of farming, as a sort of apprentice ship for the jobs selected by the State with approved farmers. Three hundred and twenty Ixys pass through Scheyville every year, ‘and the loss to the Government is only £lOOO a year. When fu*>est scope is given to the products of this settlement, it is expected that the training farms will be self-supporting. Each of the four farms is within easy reach of the big State experimental farms, and the boys have the advantage ci being coached by the principal instructors \in the State Service. The demand by farmers for these boys is always far ahead of the supply. They were told on leaving England that they would be paid 15s a week by farmers; as a matter of fact, none gets less than 255. at starting, and some, who arrived in September last, are getting £2 ss. a week now. The age at which they are selected at Home is from 14 to 18 years, and the average age at embarkation is 17 years. The Barwell Boys. Sir Henry Barwell, Premier of South Australia, is the strongest advocate of boy migration in the Commonwealth, said Mr. Bavin, who explained that the system in that State is somewhat different. Tho boys are sent on landing to approved farmers as apprentices. They are paid at the outset 255. a week, from which amount they are allowed 4s. a week pocket-money, the balance being compulsorily saved and placed to their credit in the bank. From this account they in time refund their passage-money from England, which is £9, tho State paying a similai amount to the shipping company. When they have completed their apprenticeship of three years, the Government undertakes to find them land. “There is not 1 par cent, of failures among the Barwell boys,” said Mr. Bavin. “We propose to transport a little hit of Derbyshire into Taranaki,” said Mr. Bavin, in explaining that the Y.M.C.A. aimed at taking a group of boys from a particular county, to send to a particular district in one of the Dominions. They would be near to each other, as they were at Home; in that propinquity lay, he said, much of the success they hoped to attain •vith their scheme in New Zealand. “Those boys merge imperceptibly into the population, without the slightest trouble to the country,” he added, as he told the story, in glowing terms, of a lad of seventeen who came out twelve years ago, and went on to the land. He is now going Home, with his wife and three children, to visit the old folks, having amassed a tidy little fortune of £6OOO. New Zealand Well Advertised.

Answering questions, Mr. Bavin said that, speaking generally the prospects for immigration were very favourable in Australia. All the State Governments and the Federal Government were keenly anxious to arrive at some definite, well-consider-ed schemes for assimilating people from the Old Countrj', who were willing to oome out. Australia absorbed 29,000 immigrants last year, and is aiming at 40,000 this year. “In our work in London, however, we find an overwhelming percentage of people expressing a desire to come to New Zealand. Tlia first nine months of last year we had 17.531 inquiries, mostly from young men, desirous of migrating ; had it been possible, tho majority would have come to New Zealand. The Dominion lias a great name in the Old Country. Almost every day there is news of some sort in the London n-'-'c'-s Iron’ Now Zealand. I am surprised to hear you say that people claim the Dominion is not well adver t se-1 in England.” Mr. Bavin will proceed to Palmerston North on Monday, to interview the Rev. Blackburn, who is director

oF migration for the Anglican Church of New Zealand. On Tuesday, he will go to Christchurch to see the Archbishop and other Church authorities, and later to Dunedin, where he hopes, as well, to meet the branch of tho Overseas League, of which ho is a member. Ho will give an address at the Rotary Club in Wellington ou April 10, and will then visit Auckland, leaving for England by the Ruahine on April 24.>