WILL EMIGRATION BE RESUMED?

Northern Advocate, 26 July 1935, Page 6

WILL EMIGRATION BE RESUMED?

The question of the resumption of emigration on a large scale to the overseas Dominions is discussed from a new angle by the “Sydney Morning Herald.”, Referring to complaints against conditions in Australia, as made by disgruntled immigrants who have returned to Britain, the '‘llol*olol’ says that, whether the complaints arc justified or not, it is well to remember that these are not new phenomena. Former generations suffered, but mainly in silence. The present age is highly articulate. Migration has always had its own “growing pains,” and very few migrants

liqvo escaped them. But with time ■a, lid prosperity, the majority oi (hem forget the early discomforts. It is doubtful,, in the opinion of the Sydney paper, whether there remains in Britain today any sneh large class as once existed willing and anxious to tempt the unknown. For all the hard times. Britain is still one of the Avorld’s most comfortable countries, and her unemployed are provided for in a way which at least prevents them from turning to emigration in sheer despair. . The same causes' have had their marked effect cm‘army recruiting statistics. Dominion statesmen, therefore, have perhaps little reason to assume that a dammeclup flood of migrants is. only waiting to burst present barriers and invade the outer parts of the Empire in alarming numbers. That may be true concerning some countries, but not concerning Britain, the one place beyond all others from which Australia (and New Zealand) desire to see her new- settlers , coine. men full prosperity returns, Britain, with her own population tending to become static (and the British Isles cannot reasonably be expected to carry an indefinitely expanding number), wall in all probability be able to find work for practically everyone. That will mean that those who then betake themselves to other lands wall be those to-wdiom, by a kind of natural selection, the desire for change and adventure makes a special appeal. These will not find it> all plain sailing, any more than their predecessors did; but they are not of a type greatly given to self-pity and bewmilihg.