IMMIGRATION.

Evening Star, Issue 22974, 3 June 1938, Page 8

IMMIGRATION.

The committee of the Five Million Club with which the name of Mr W. E. Barnard, Speaker of the House of Representatives, has been most prominently associated, has brought down a report which shows that it is making the right approach to what may be regarded as a romantically distant objective. That the objective is a distant one need not cause discouragement to less ardent supporters of the movement. That New Zealand needs more population is generally accepted, in theory. A total of five millions certainly will take a long time to acquire, but enthusiasts for this cause, we take it, are less wedded to fixed numbers than convinced that there is truth in the old saying: Who auneth at the sky Shoots higher far than he that means a tree.

They have the satisfaction also of knowing that if their cause is right, as wo believe it to be, every appreciable stage of success will have its value. If population is to be increased significantly in the years that lie immediately ahead it can only be by immigration, and the committee has done wisely in setting itself first to find out what the measures of popular approval and objection are likely to be to renewed State encouragement for this means of adding to numbers. A few years ago short time would have been needed for this inquiry. The reaction against Stateaided immigration was extreme, due to the fact that the last period during which that policy held sway directly preceded the world-wide depression with its consequence of unemployment for which, so far as New Zealand was concerned, immigration was, for a time, however oddly, held by some minds to have been the cause. Though it was not the cause, it could not fail to be an intensitive, and “ immigration, during a painful period, was something very different from a blessed word. The depression psychology is, however, passing, in spite of politics that have their interest in keeping it alive. The Government, which said rightly some time ago that it would not consider bringing more immigrants to New Zealand until unemployment was ended, has since said that that problem is now no more than normal, though it is only ■kept normal, if the word is applicable, at the cost of an unemployment tax which is both abnormal and a burden. The committee lias found no strong feeling either for or against a resumption of immigration; the feeling that is favourable appears to be extensive enough to require that the Government and others should at least begin to give their most serious consideration to the question. The committee considers objections and believes, as most economists would do, that those are ill-founded. Then it considers the advantages to be gained, and makes a convincing case. It suggests that present needs would best be served by a series of small collateral schemes to meet special requirements rather than by one larger plan encompassing the entire Dominion, and, provided the Government remains always in touch with schemes, that view is doubtless correct. With the three fundamental reasons set down by the committee as requiring an increase of population by immigration few will be likely to disagree. They are: “ First, so that the cost of production of existing industries can be brought to a level where it will compare favourably with similar costa elsewhere by increased production brought about by increased demand. Secondly, so that new industries can be established without fear of harming exports through a simultaneous diminution of total imports. And, thirdly, as a means of strengthening the local market for primary products in order to mitigate the effects of any reduction of the overseas market that may have to be faced in the future. Other reasons,' such as defence and taxation relief, will suggest themselves. Domestic servants and farm labourers could be brought to New Zealand without any injury to existing interests, and the habitual shortage of these two classes may be held to be not without its influence on our own declining birth rate. Great Britain also, however, has a declining birth rate; it is seeking to make much more of agricultural development, so that farm workers from Britain do not promise to be easily obtainable. But the committee finds no objections to going further, _ provided the new immigrants are, politically and otherwise, assimilable. Probably it is British boys who will make the best of all immigrants, and there are schemes already for transplanting them abroad which have proved their worth. The committee would develop secondary industries and work for a greater variety of agricultural employment. Its report is a beginning of research and of popular education which should havo the greatest value.