MIGRATION PLAN

Manawatu Standard, Volume LIX, Issue 21, 23 December 1938, Page 8

MIGRATION PLAN

URGED ON GOVERNMENT. MOTION IN COMMONS. (United Press Association—By Electric . Telegraph— Received December 22, 1.25 p.m. LONDON, Dec. 21.

The House of Commons, without a division, accepted a motion urging the Government, in conjunction with the Dominions, to consider all practicable plans for promoting the settlement of people from Britain, and affirming readiness to co-operate in approved schemes.

Mr J. F. Crowder (Con.), moving the motion', asked the Government to increase its financial assistance for migration. He hoped the Government would early invite the Dominions to consider a composite, well-thought-out plan. Experience showed that an increase in production, employment, and wages resulted from an increase in population. Sir Henry Page-Croft suggested the formation of an Empire Development Company, the original directors of which would be approved by the Prime Minister and be financial and agricultural experts. Money advanced to the company by the State would be an investment to be repaid probably within 23 years. Only ten millions would be necessary for a small experiment in British Columbia. TRADE POLICY.

Mr Malcolm MacDonald (Secretary for the Dominions), announcing that the Government accepted the terms of the resolution, said that if the British people did not develop new young countries they would be open to the reproach of sitting on a vast area of the earth’s surface and preventing its beneficial use. Moreover, the increased prosperity and power of the Dominions was perhaps the best way of augmenting the strength of Britain itself. (Cheers). Mr Macdonald indicated that _ lie was thinking, not only of the Empire’s physical security, but its moral influence throughout the world. The Empire Settlement Board would discuss Sir Page-Croft’s sblieme with him. He assured the House that if £150,000 was insufficient for the settlement schemes the Government would ask for more. The Government contemplated much larger populations being settled in the Dominions and anticipated the- time when millions additional would get a livelihood there.

“That’s the scale on which we are thinking as the ultimate objective,” he said. He did not wish to minimise the importance of land settlement, but if the House was thinking in terms of millions of settlers it must accept the fact that such settlement, would be only possible by a steady development of the secondary industries. He would iike to see manufacturers here and in the Dominions produce simpler forms of goods, taking additional population to help in their production, thus increasing the army of consumers for the liiore complicated forms of manufacture which Britain was still able to send in under preference. He was not convinced that the development of secondary industries in the Dominions would mean a decrease of British exports. “It seems to me it is not merely essential, but the principal part of the policy of Dominion development that, the secondary industries in the Dominions should be steadily expanded. If we are not going t.o allow a steady expansion of secondary industries don’t let us talk about developing the Empire overseas, because it cannot be done under any other conditions,” he added. Mr Ellis Smith (Lab.), said the statement issued by the Federation of British Industries had done more to undermine the confidence of New Zealand relations with Britain than anything in the past few months: