MIGRATION POLICY

Otago Daily Times, Issue 22398, 20 October 1934, Page 27

MIGRATION POLICY

GROUP SETTLEMENT CONDEMNED LONDON COMMENTS. (Fitoil Odr Own Corresi’ONUent.) LONDON, September 7. The political correspondent of the Morning Post remarks; “An outspoken denunciation of all schemes for group settlement of the Empire through public corporations or chartered corporations is the principal feature of the report of the Inter-depart-mental Committee on Migration Policy. A considerable section of the report is devoted to a disparagement of the system of group migration to undeveloped territories in the dominions, which has been strongly advocated recently both in Parliament and elsewhere. This is likely to cause considerable controversy. Extract from the leading article: this is better.” “The dominions are admittedly, for the moment, besot with the same troubles which afflict the rest of the world. But they possess vast untapped resources, awaiting the man-power to develop them. If these resources cannot be utilised for want of markets, the dominions are destined to remain static, and migrants are superfluous. But it is surely a hopelessly defeated attitude which envisages such a future for our Overseas Empire. A migration policy worthy the name must be founded on the assumption that the dominions are capable of a gradual but indefinite expansion. And it must derive urgency from the reflection that if people of British stock shrink from undertaking that expansion, people of other stock Will sooner or later do it for them. If and when that happened we should have to write finis to the Empire. The report of the Inter-departmental Committee will scarcely, we fear, help to delay the menace of so unpleasant an eventuality.” A NUMBER OF USEFUL SUGGESTIONS. The Times:— “ The general tone of the report, however, is negative. The committee is convinced—and gives reasons for its conviction—that the really valuable migration is the spontaneous movement of p>**ple who see an opportunity to better their own circumstances or those of their children; that this movement will revive as economic conditions improve in the dominions; and that in the meantime no organised transfer of population will be of much use. The right line of approach, it says, is not to endeavour to transport men and women to the dominions regardless of economic conditions and of the possibility of marketing their produce, but to do everything possible to help to create the conditions in the dominions which provoked in the past, and will provoke in the future, a flow of spontaneous migration, ‘ and then to see that every obstacle which lies in the way of such migration is removed and that every facility which can increase it is provoked. The report contrasts the epeetacular appeal of the. two methods, but contends that in effectiveness the advantage is all on the side of the loss spectacular. ... “For reasons given, and given.very convincingly, the report regards it as. out of the question to encourage any considerable scheme of migration at the present time. It recognises the wisdom meanwhile of considering the lines along which migration, as it revives, should be directed and the means by which it can be assisted most effectively. It makes a number of useful suggestions to this end. If the facts it assembles and the deductions it draws fiom them are depressing to the advocates of short cuts and of spectacular schemes for redressing the balance of the Empire, even the enthusiast will admit that it sets out with admirable clearness of reasoning aspects of the migration problem which cannot be ignored in any serious discussion.” ENCOURAGES NOTHING. The Daily Express:— "Their report, in ninety-three pages, encourages nothing and discourages much. All their efforts can be summed, up in these words: We must wait for times to ineud. They shut their eyes altogether to the possibility of development iu the Crown colonies. These vast and rich territories, governed from Whitehall, capable of producing so much that we can produce, should afford a fine opportunity for a baud of adventurous colonists.”