PEOPLING THE EMPIRE

Dominion, Volume 31, Issue 74, 21 December 1937, Page 16

PEOPLING THE EMPIRE

An Essential Task THE BARE SPACES Unless there is a new flow of migration from Britain to the Dominions, , the future of the Empire must be precaricuSs, said the "Daily Telegraph” editorially recently. In that outspoken warning at the conference on Empire Migration ami Development, Viscount Horne compelled attention to some of the most urgent problems of Imperial policy. Statesmen in the Dominions have shown a growing recognition of the principles which he laid down, that thin populations and undeveloped land encourage envy and tempt attack and that the belter distribution of British population throughout British territory is therefore of vital importance to each several State and to the whole fabric of the Empire. “Populate or perish” has become a familiar phrase in Australia. Her Prime Minister said bluntly last spring that she could not “justify her position so long as she is not occupying her la rids adequately.”

General Smuts has told the Dominions that they cannot have the influence in world affairs which they need unless they make large additions to their population. Judged by whatever test, strategic, economic, social, or political, it is clearly undesirable that so large a proportion of the population of the Empire should be concentrated in Great Britain. There are in Britain, as Lord Horne pointed out, 40S people to the square mile, although Australia has only two, Canada three, South Africa 10, and New Zealand 15. For some time past the disproportion has been accentuated. Two hundred thousand emigrants used to be sent to the Dominions every year. The depression drove numbers of them home again. Now things are better. In 1930 the balance of returns was comparatively small. There are grounds for hope that migration may soon be resumed on a considerable scale. But expectations should be cautious. The capacity of the Dominions to absorb population is often exaggerated. Those “envious eyes” which, Lord Horne reminded us, are cast on the unoccupied territories of the British Empire omit to note how much of them is unfit for settlement. There are, indeed, large virgin areas which, with good agricultural prices, might be profitably farmed, and many districts which, with Intensive culture, would support a large population. On the other hand, it is to be remembered that

mechanisation is steadily diminishing the amount of labour required by agriculture. Imperial migration ou any large scale must depend on systematic, balanced development of the resources of the Dominions. That involves expansion of. manufacturing industry. Thus far, the economic organisation of the Empire has proceeded by the broad principle that the Dominions supply Britain with agricultural produce and raw materials and Britain sends out to them manufactured goods. It has been found, however, that agreements on this basis are quite compatible with the establishment by the Dominions of flourishing secondary industries. Lord Horne looks forward to much greater industrial development. Inj dustries themselves are to migrate with their workers. Manufacturers are to transfer not only a part, hut even the whole of their undertakings overseas. Lord Horne rather enigmatically predicted that many of Britain’s industries would have a better future in the Dominions than in Britain. It is difficult to imagine such comprehensive transference. At the present time there is in practically all important trades a shortage of skilled workers. These are just the key men who would be necessary for the establishment of industries overseas. Britain cannot do without them now, and there is no sign of their being superfluous in : the near future.