A.—6a

56

The Psychological Difficulty. I do not, wish to detain the Conference at any greater length, but I shoulel like, to say just one word more about what Colonel Buckley referred to as the, psychological elifficulty. Of ejourse, one has always got to fight against the sense of strangeness, the unknown, but in an Empire like ours we can overcome that by greater development of mutual trade, by the; spreading of better information, by better service in our newspapers, by cheapening the postage-rates, and by encouraging communication between settlers anel friends at Home, perhaps by airship-development, anil not least by facilities for enabling the settler in the Dominions to e-,ome: Home again after a few years on easy terms to visit his friends. Importance of creating a Right Mental Attitude towards Oversea Settlement. Besides that I think the important thing that we have: got to create is the right mental attitude in all our communities. For instance, in this exmntry we are still far too much under the domination of the idea that this business of migration and settlement is simply a sort of safety-valve to unemployment. From that point of view it is not considered by one section of people until a grave unemployment crisis has arisen, and by others it is looked upon as an attempt to dodge our social responsibilities, to push people out of the country, instead of facing our social and economic responsibilities towards them. Now, we: want to get away from that point of view, and to treat it as a policy of building up trade, building up Empire, anil helping social reform. The people with whom we have the most difficulty are the very people who are always keenly interested in such a reform as town-planning. We have got to make people in this country understand that Empire settlement is only town-planning on a large scale, anel that Empire-development is only social reform writ large. On the other hand, you have got a similar difficulty in the Dominions. You have, on the one side, the type of person who simply thinks of immigration in terms of getting cheap and aelaptable labour. The: cheaper it is, and the more readily adaptable it is, the more he is favourable to it. He would prefer the sheepskin-clad Galician, regardless of what kind of citizen he makes in future, to the less adaptable but in the long-run sturdier and more self-reliant Britisher. On the other hand, you have got the labour objection arising from the same point of view, which simply thinks of competitors. Now, we have got to create the point of view which thinks not of recruiting labour, but of recruiting citizens. Anything that can be done to promote that point of view in the Dominions— it cannot be done by legislation, but it can be done by the influence of those at the head of affairs —anything that can be done to get that point of view strengthened, to create the atmosphere that makes for a ready welcome of the immigrant when he lands, is all to the good. This whole business of settlement is an intensely human business. Your new settler, when he lands and passes the formalities of the Immigration Department anil finds himself in his now country, is very sensitive, very touchy, very easily discouraged, very much like a new boy at a strange school. At that moment anything in the nature of a friendly word, a hand-shako, or a little bit of good advice makes the whole difference in the worlel. Ido hope that those who have the whole of this policy of development at heart, those who perhaps remember what they themselves or their brothers or sons met with over here during the war, will realize how much they can help individually towards making this great policy a success. Even Distribution of Empire Population a Fundamental Need. Indeed, while I fully agree that the development of Empire settlement can only go on hand-in-hand with the development of trade and the spread of capital, I do feel that it is the basic element of the whole problem of development. The sound distribution of our population in the Empire is the key to social and economic well-being in every part. If I may add one thing further, it is also the key to the problem of defence, in other discussions during this Conference I shall have to point out to the representatives of the Dominions the enormous burden whie:h the defence of the Empire imposes upon this country over and above the terrible burdens imposed upon us by social conditions largely due to overpopulation. The answer which I know I shall get from the Dominions is that while willing to help to the extent of their capacities, those capacities are, in fact, limited by the very fact that they are faced with the problems arising from under population, with great tasks of development which need to be done before they can have a population that can play an adequate part in the defence of the Empire. In those two arguments there is one common element, one common obstacle; —overpopulation here, underpopulation in the Dominions. Now, if we can, during the years of peace —and I hope they may be long years which may be granted to vs —get the population of the Empire more evenly distributed, that even distribution will mean a far more rapid and healthy growth in each part, and we shall be the bettor able to meet the problem of defence, and secure an adequate share by each part in the common task, without laying upon any part of the Empire an excessive burden or leading to the danger of that undue diversion of our resources on defence, which can be summed up in the word militarism. To secure our mutual peace and defence: without incurring burdens which mean a militarist organization of our society we must in the next generation see that our population is more evenly distributed and grows more healthily throughout the Empire. If the United States have grown in the last century from five millions to a population of one hundred millions, there is no reason why in the coming century we should not grow to a population of two hundred or three hundred millions of white people in the Empire. That bears equally on those political relations which we have discussed at intervals without coming to any very definite solutions. We stand in a position of absolute equality of status. We are also faced with the position of a very profound inequality in actual population, in actual power of co-operating in the common task, and it is only as we can make the reality of our position, as between the great Dominions and ourselves, correspond more closely to the theoretical