WHITE LABOUR IN THE TROPICS

Evening Post, Volume LXXIX, Issue 72, 28 March 1910, Page 6

WHITE LABOUR IN THE TROPICS

For something like twenty-five years the sugar industry had been carried on in the coast districts of tropical Queens* land with the aid of coloured labour fiom the South Sea Islands, when the edict went forth in 1885 that the importation of indentured native labour must cease after 1890. The five years' grace was allowed because at the time the price of sugar was low, there was no alternative labour, and immediate prohibition wonld have caused the abandon- | meiit of the industry. At that time, too, the belief, still widely held, was almost universal, that white men could not compete with natives of the tropics in laborious work, such as the sugar plantations entail, under a Queensland sun, nor rear families in a tropical climate. At the same time, a strong force of public opinion was behind the measure, and the question of coloured labour was in the forefront when, in the first year of the new century, the first Commonwealth Parliament was elected. In its first session it decreed not only the prohibition of any further introduction of Kanakas, but the deportation of those already in the country at the termination of their en£agcn>ents, those who had made their homes in Australia (some fifteen hundred in number) being excepted. Under this Act, in 1905 and 1906 about 4300 were shipped back to the islands, and thenceforth the industry has been practically dependent on white labour. The moasure was not carried without strong opposition. A Royal Commission in 1889 had reported that north of Townsville while men could not cultivate cane, that for five mouths in the year whites could not work ; and that without coloured labour tne chief industry would collapse, and Northern Queensland become practically a desert. These views found expression in Parliament and press, and were held by the Chambers of Commerce and other commercial bodies ; and a sufficient time has now elapsed to enable 6ome judgment to be formed as to how far, if at all, these forecasts have been justified. In the Nineteenth Century for February there is an article on the subject by Professor J. W. Gregory, F.R.S., ! who has carefully investigated the subject, and marshalled a striking array of facts and figures bearing on the question, and the results are as interesting as unexpected. In the first place the apprehended ruin of a great industry has ■not come to pass. On the contrary, while in 1901 the uugar mills were struggling to keep afloat under their heavy obligations to financial institutions, their present condition is reported as flourishing. In 1903 Australia produced about half the sugar it required, or 92,500 tons; in 1908-9 its product was 196,000 tons, leaving a margin for export. Higher wages arc paid, while at tho same time tb« co#t of production has fallen and I th* -yuiue pi «ugar propwttM baa xiua,

while the area under sugar cultivation has increased by more than a third. In the shire of Mackay the rateable value of land, whicfa had continuously declined from 1895 to 1900, took a turn, and rose from £642,000 in 1901 to £694,000 in 1905, the figure for 1908 being £684,000. In answer to the suggestion that the prosperity is artificial and due to the State bounty, Professor Gregory thinks that the bounty is really no gain to the industry, as it is more than paid by the excise. Ita object was solely to discourage black labour and encou- j rage the employment of white men, and it entails a costly system of aocounts and Customs supervision. There is an import duty of £6 a ton on foreigngrown sugar and an excise of £4 a ton on Australian-grown, of which latter amount JD3 is repaid as bounty on all grown By white labour. In the seven years from 1901 to 1908 the excise duty received by the Treasury exceeded the bounty by over a million and a half sterling. Both excise and bounty are to be reduced one-third in 1911, another third in 1912, and to cease in 1913. There will still remain in favour of the growers a protective duty of 33 per cent., and a fact is pointed out which is not without local interest — that in New Zealand, where sugar is imported free, the price is as high as in Australia. The question naturally arises,- how an industry can nourish under such altered conditions of wages? A Kanaka was paid £3 a year ; a white man can earn a 6 much in a week. But, it is pointed out, the Kanaka had to be housed and fed, and an immigration fee had to be paid; his average cost being £25 to £35 a year, and except in the sugar season he was a very unprofitable servant. Moreover, the death-roll was heavy, varying from 26 per thousand per annum to 42.73, notwithstanding that they were picked men, who had passed medical examination, and served only three years. As the rate among the white population, including infant mortality and deaths from old age, was 12 per thousand, ono seems forced to admit that white men stand the climate best. The employers have not the responsibility of housing and maintaining the white labourers, who, for the most part, are required for only come six weeks, and migrate from place to place, returning often year after year to the same plantations, while some settle permanently with their families in the sugar areas. The feebleness and j degeneracy among the children, once attributed to climatic conditions, are now traced to the ankyloetoma, an internal parasite of the "hookworm" family. In the schools, the children show ability equal to those of other districts in Australia. But the conditions of life are not always eucb as might be desired; •nJ, as the profeeeor points OUt, if people in the tropic* choose to dwell in "ovens" of corrugated iron without ceilings or verandahs, and the women and children suffer, it is not fair to blame the climate. A satisfactory feature in the experiment is the loyal manner in which employers have accopted tho decision ol the Commonwealth to carry on the industry by white labour, though apprehensive at first of labour difficulties, which, however, have not arisen. It may bo thought premature to pronounce a final verdict; but it may be aafely asserted that th» forecasts of immediate ruin have been completely falsified, and it would seem that the long-cherished theory that white men. cannot work and thrive in a tropic clime is one more old doctrine that, 1 when put to the test, has been proved to be an illusion. These results make for a hopeful outlook for the ultimate settlement ot the Northern Territory of Australia by wnite people.