HINDU LABOUR

Evening Post, Volume XCII, Issue 58, 6 September 1916, Page 2

HINDU LABOUR

IS IT A MENACE?

TRADES COUNCIL REPRESENTATION.

The alleged influx of Hindu labour to tlie Dominion was considered recently by thfe Wellington Trades and Labour Council. A committee was set up to consider the matter, and the secretary of the council (Mr. L. M. A. Reardsn) has now addressed' the following letter to the Prime Minister and the Minister for Internal Affairs :—

"The Wellington Trades and Labour Council desires me to direct- your attention to tlie fact that within the kust three or four years Hindus have bean coming to this colony in considerable numbers. The Wellington Wharf Labourers' Union recently took a ballot on the question of whether Hindus should be admitted to membership of the union, ;vnd decided against admitting them. The flax workers in the Waikato have had to face the fact that these people are getting employment in tlie .flax industry, and, as the lesser of two evils, seem to be prepared to admit them to membership of the union. Further, on the authority of the Anckland Star, Hindus are a familiar sight in that city, and largo numbers go to such centres as Te Awamutu, Otorohonga, Te Kuiti, Ohapu, and Taumarumii to take employment as agricultural a-nd pastoral workers.

"'This council has been under the impression that the immigration policy of the New Zealand Government was the policy of a white New Zealand, and I 'am directed to call your attention to the fact that if this influx of coloured labour is allowed to continue, New Zealand may have to Face' social questions of the utmost seriousness, comparable to the question which the South African colonists and the white population of the Southern States of America have to face.

"I am further directed to urge that the time to deal with this matter is now, before it becomes a question of greater magnitude and consequently more difficult to deal with. We therefore suggest that if the present immigr__tion laws •permit the entry of these people, they should be immediately amended in the direction of giving the Government at ■least as much power to deal with the matter as is possessed by the Canadian Government, which about two years ago bad to deal with this very question on the arrival of a vessel in Vancouver with a large number of Hindu immigrants. •The Government of Canada refused to allow them to land and compelled them to return to India.

"In our opinion, to permit the entry into New Zealand of Hindus is equivalent to inviting a coloured population numbering some 300.000,000 to come here" and settle, and unless the matter is handled firmly by the Government, we may in a. very few years have lost the power •to say whether New Zealand shall be a colony of Asia or a colony of Europe.