IRISH IMMIGRATION.

New Zealand Tablet, Volume I, Issue 20, 13 September 1873, Page 9

IRISH IMMIGRATION.

TttE Lyttelton Times m a long leader in which it sets itself to the task of white-washing Dr Featherston, in order that the Government may by comparison look the blackw, while,considering that his defence in regard to the bungling of immigration 'generally, cannot exonerate him from all blame, says that he " must be acquitted on what we may call the Irish charge "— i c., the charge of neglecting Ireland as an emigration field. The « Lyttelton Times ' makes much of « a proportionate supply of Irish." Quoting from Dr Featherston, it says that, " According to the population, the relative numbers should have- been — English and Welsh, 3924 ; Scotch, 581 ; Irish, 934. On a comparison of these figures, it will be seen that in the case of the Scotch there was anexcessof 40 on the proportionate number, whilo in the case of the Irish there was a deficiency of 13. It will therefore, I trust, be sufficiently apparent to the Government that the complaint referred to is entirely without foundation." The 'Times' proceeds— "The Agent-General, in concluding his defence on this point, says that although the relative ' numbers, as it happens, are nearly what they should have been,, the idea of maintaining a fixed proportion had never for a moment been euteriained by him, his chief desire having been to establish throughout every part of the United Kingdom a steady flow of emigratiou to New Zealand [!], With this object in view, he continued all the - local agencies which he found established on his arrival in .England, Scotland, and Ireland, and availed himself of every favorable opportunity of adding to their number from time to time. So far from neglecting Ireland, Dr Featherston contends, one of the special agents sent home by the Government with the view of promoting emigration, from Germany was at once despatched to Belfast, when it was found that the stringent nature of the German laws would prevent him from acting in that part of the Continent for which' he was destined." The ' Daily Times'' publishes the ' Lyttelton Times's ' acquittal of Dr Feafcherston approvingly, and the Dunedin ' Evening Star' a few weeks ago published an extract from Dr Featherston's letter with the view of showing that the numerous complaints made on the subject of Irish immigration were unfounded, bufc Dr Featherston himislf admits the justice of the complaints. Writing on the 16th May, not yet four months ago, he sa;\ a :—" The Hon.' Mr O'Rorke will fiud by a return forwarded to the Government that his complaint with respecb to the non-appointment of agents, and the inadequacy of the advertisements in the newspapers of the South of Ireland (in the justice of which complaint 1 quite concur), has now been remedied." The italics are ours. Here it may be mentioned that the Public Works and Immigration Scheme became law in 1870 ; that it was not till June 1872 the Belfast agency was established, and uutil December of the same year that the Dublin agency was esfablished.