VITAL NEED

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXIII, Issue 22543, 7 October 1936, Page 14

VITAL NEED

EMPIRE MIGRATION VIEW OF CONGRESS DOMINION'S POSITION CO-OPERATION URGED NATIONAL SECURITY [BY TELEGRAPH —PRESS association] WELLINGTON. Tuesday A resolution which affirmed the / rital importance of the early reinforcement of the populations of the overseas Dominions bv organised and substantial migration from Great Britain, made recommendations to that end and recommended that the Governments concerned should cooperate in arranging schemes to ensure that any surplus population leaving Great Britain should settle within the Empire, was carried unanimously at to-day's session of the Congress of Federated Chambers of Commerce of the British Empire. The resolution was a compromise of resolutions which were originally to have been submitted by Britain, Australia and New Zealand. St Thomas Wilford, formerly High Commissioner for New Zealand, ' was in the chair. The resolution was moved by Mr. J. E. Enilvn-Jones (Cardiff and Newport), whose speech was vigorous and was a strong advocacy of filling up tho vacant spaces of the oversea Dominions with British people. Ho said he thought tho truth about tho Dominions' failure to increase their population Wf.s that there had developed an ill-balanced economy. There was far too much concentration on industrial activities and too little 011 agrarian. .'[die Labour and Land Tho orly way to increase the wealth < of the Dominions and the whole world, added Mr. Enilvn-Jones, was by the application of idle labour to fertile land. By so creating wealth they would be able to absorb the unemployed in their own countries and in the Homeland. It was not a problem of over- / production, but in reality a crisis of under consumption and the maldistribution of primary products throughout the world. Mr. It, M. Clark (Sydney) , in seconding ;he resolution, said he was in hearty agreement with the object in /- view, though he was not in agreement wi.h all of Mr. Emlyn-Jones' statements. Mr. Clark said a migrant from Britain might put someono out of work oversea. What was wanted was migration on a large se;;ie. A largo population overseas would enable Britain to carry a much larger population tl an she did, and large populations abroad and at home would make Britain invincible. Mr. Bussell (Brisbane) said they could net accept the view that the I Dominions should merely be Britain's supplier of primary products. What they were aiming at in Australia was a balanced economy. .'New Zealand's Position Mr. Martin (Wellington) -admitted '• that Now Zealand's carrying capacity was a population variously estimated at from five to ten million. He admitted that our own population was not satisfactorily, that the birthrate was declining, and also that in the last four years the departures exceeded the arrivals and that prior , stoppage of migration we were actually receiving 10,000 more people than departed every year. The popu--1 10 '" oro ? sc to -day was estimated at 12,000 annually, which -admittedly would nean only 120,000 more people in ten years' time. Sir Montague Burton (Leeds) said it was estimated that every person additional to the population gave employment to another person. Mr Z. Stanley Leatherbv (Plymouth) spoke on behalf of the fishermen of England. If the Empire could iind room for some of these magnificent people, he said, it would render a service that would pay. They were hard up against it. and thev were the best type of man Britain could send. Land-Hungry Nations Viscount Elibank, speaking as a dele- ' gate, (aid he found himself in entire agreement with Mr. Emlyn-Jones. In spite of Mr. Emlyn-Jones' eloquence he know he was speaking the truth , Thers was what might be called land hunger in the world, which was finding expression in different ways. In Italy /hey had gone out and taken what they wanted; in Germany every ; few weeks we heard demands that her former colonies should be returned, and tho mrndated territories handed back; and in both countries were they going on increasing the population by the command of dictators and building up huge armies and armaments with, as far as one could see, only one object. Was it extraordinary that theso people, determined to expand and overflow, should turn their eyes to the vast, unpopulated, fertile spaces in the British Domin ons, capable of containing many millions of white inhabitants? Bold Policy Essential We iihould not only consider migration from the point of view of building up our own Empire and giving an outlet to our own people, Lord Elibank continued, but we had to con- ' sider it from tho world point of view. It was essential that migration should be tack led in a bold and comprehensive manner. He agreed sincerely with Mr. Clark when he said that lie did not want single migrants, who only created more unemployment, * but migration on a large scale and continuous, creating tbe settlement of large areas. Lord Elibank said it might well bo that they should export moro of their capital with their migrants, but 110 suggested that the Dominions should make :ho way easy by making land available on favourable terms. There was no prospect of capital being invested in any Dominion in private enterprise unless it received proper consideration when it arrived. If it were taxed out of existenco or anything wero done to make trado impossible, very little capital would como out from the Old Country. Foreign European Sottlers , The blood of Britain was not so unmixed, Lord Elibank concluded, and ho made the point that the Dominions might find it in their interest, as America had done, to open their doors to a certain proportion of foreign European blood. Mr. W. R. Fee (Auckland) expressed tho view that thero was underlying the debate the idea that New Zealand must be a primary producing country. " If she wero to become a safe country she must do as others had done and increase her population, and to do that she must increase and develop her secondary industries. Mr. Mansfield (London) said it was no use sending out people unless they wero voluntary migrants. There would ' be 110 voluntary migrants unless they saw opportunity abroad and that opportunity must be provided. There were any-amount or people with determination who would come out if they saw opportunity. The motion was carried unanimously Md with acclamation.