FAST END IMMIGRANTS.

Manawatu Standard, Volume XLI, Issue 9344, 20 October 1910, Page 2

FAST END IMMIGRANTS.

LADS WHO ARE KEEN TO GO TO NEW ZEALAND. "BROUGHT UP ROUGH AND READY." A VISIT TO POPLAR. V (Auckland Star's Special Correspondent.) LONDON, Sept. 9. Fifty lads from the East End of London will be among the happiest boys in the world if Mr T. E. Sedgwick, who recently returned from Ne\v Zealand, succeeds in collecting the £600 required to transplant them to farms in. the Dominion.' .V... The New Zealand Government, it will be remembered, have undertaken to" find situations on farms for an experimental batch of 50 East End lads, to supervise them on tho voyage out, and to place them under the guardianship of the Labour Department during the twelve months for which their situations are to be guaranteed. The money for the steamer tares, which will be £12 a head, has to be provided at this end. - There is no difficulty about getting 50 suitable boys to make the long journey. Mr Sedgwick tells me that he could probably find one boy in every house in Poplar ready to emigrate if given the chance. At Mr Sedgwick's house in Polar one night this week I was able to meet and talk with some of the lads who have been provisionally selected for the experiment. They impressed me favourably—all the more so when one considers the environment in which they are con- j denincd, through no fault of their own* to live in tho East End. All of them were what is known as "blind-alley" boys —i.e., boys who at an early age had followed occupations which could lead to nothing. After passing the age of 16 they had been forced to seek other employment, and casual jobs were the only ones that came their way. London and the other great English centres are full of boys like this. On leaving school they take situations as messengers or shop boys, with a maximum wage of 10s a week. When no longer required, after they have passed from boyhood to early manhood, they have to accept casual work in shipyards, saw, oil-cake, or lead mills, or jam, wirework, or rope factories, where the pay is fairly good—for a youth —but the work is so intermittent in character that many only get one week's work in a month.

The lads I saw at Mr Sedgwick's seemed strong, willing, active and intelligent. From the nature of their life in London they ought to prove teachable and adaptable, and they seem very keen to go. Most of them were in situations, and they were prepared to leave these for the chance of bettering themselves in a new The most they could look forward to in Englamd "was a wage of 25s a week, with "too old at 45" staring them in the face, and beyond that the workhouse. It is a cruel, an utterly inhuman fate to which England's social system condemns these bright, honest, decent lads, typical of thousands in all the groat cities of the United Kingdom. They are still young enough to be given a chance of life before they begin to deteriorate. The most intelligent lads see at once that their chances are infinitely better in New Zealand, and they are keen to go. The great drawback is having to leave their homes and families, but this disappears when they realise that by going on ahead they may prepare a better home in the polonies for their relations than they could ever hope for in the Old Country. Other boys are reluctant to go without their "mates." — comradeship between boys i 3 a very real and sincere thing in the East End—but under Mr Sedgwick's scheme an endeavour will be made to place the boys on farms in couplcs, so that mates noed not be separated. In spite of all qu'alms at the distance to be traversed, a superabundance of these lads are willing and anxious to be sent out to New Zealand. I feel sure there is splendid material to draw upon among the 25,000 lads who spend their evenings in social, educational and gymnastic institutions, or are otherwise in personal touch with those j who can tell them about life overseas. MR. SEDGWICK'S SCHEME. | After the lads had gone home, Mr Sedgwick explained some of the points in connection with his scheme.

"Tho Government of New Zealand," said Mr Sedgwick, "have just decided to try a party of 50 of our surplus town lads on the farms of the Dominion. They have offered assisted passages, and arranged for their supervision both on tho voyage out and while they are employed by the farmers, who have promised them work for a minimum period of twelve months. The wages will be increased quarterly, and tho bulk of the money will be banked by the employers under the Labour Department, thus securing tho repayment of the fares. "The lads have been selected, but the Central (unemployed) body for London require 'six, eight, or more weeks before the cases are finally passed' _ and their fares and outfits can be. provided. As the farmers .are waiting anxiously for the lads, and the season is advamc-

ing, my committee are of opinion that if tho money were to be advanced privately, there need be no delay. When, too, the result of the trial party has shown what ages and types give the most eatisfaction, it is calculated that

at least five thousand of. these potential

fathers of the future will be required annually in our oversea dominions, where they will be units of defence, consumers of our manufactures, and producers of the Empire's wealth, instead of deteriorating here on our cver-crowded labour market." (