MIGRATION.

Manawatu Standard, Volume XLIX, Issue 104, 2 April 1929, Page 2

MIGRATION.

AUSTRALIA’S POSITION. # ' W. * “ TEMPORARY DECLINE. “NO CAUSE FOR ALARM.” A serious view is taken by the Australian Development and Migration Commission ot the statements cabled from London regarding assisted immigration to the Commonwealth (states a Sydney correspondent). Mr E. J. Mulvapy, a member of the commission, who is charged with the Administration of the assisted passages scheme, denies that there is any cause '('or alarm, and he disagrees with the suggestion that British migration to Australia this year will reach a state of stagnation. The present decline, he says, is due entirely to natural .causes, and lie believes that the position will gradually right itself. •‘I do hot 'deny,” said Mr Mulvany the other day: “tiiat for some time past there has been a great increase in unemployment throughout Australia, duo to financial stringency and trade depression. These conditions have undoubtedly affected the movement of assisted migrants to Australia.' The. commission has already clearly pointed cut in its unemployment report that- periods of trade depression not omv in Austialia, but in any country, are followed bydecreased migration generally. ' The total number of assisted British migrants who arrived in Australia during the last three years was as follows: — 1926-, 31,260; 1927, 30,123; 1928, 22,394. The whole of these people came under the assisted passages scheme, at the request or with the approval of the State Governments. The figures for January this year do not sh©w anymarked decline on the corresponding period last year“lt cannot be said,” continued Mr Mulvany, “that the British migrants reaching Australia to-day are in any way accentuating the u nemployment problem in any of the States, as the States, before agreeing to their introduction, take every .precaution to see that they will not be added to the ranks of . the ;unegiplqyed. ..There is no reason for tlie‘ conclusion .cabled from London that migration will reach a state of stagnation this year. The flow pf migrants from Great Britain to the Commonwealth is, "and will continue to be, limited, .as it always-has been, to thfe requirements of. the States, and the Requisitions and nominees in hand at the present moment indicate that the total for the current year will bo somewhat below that of 1928. It should be borne in mind also that the newcomers will be limited to domestics, boys, and the friends and relatives of migrants already in Australia, who will not add to unemployment here.” It has been pointed out that the British Economic Mission specifically referred in-its recent report to'the. decline in assisted British- migration. It emphasised the necessity for the intensive development of. the large areas of the Commowealth at present well served by railways', roads, and other conveniences to afford greater avenues of employment for Australians and Britons. The mission suggested certain modifications of the £34,000,000 migration agreement to enable this to be attained; and the matter was receiving serious consideration. Misleading propaganda was effecting migration more than anything else.