Orders of the Day — Empire Settlement Bill.

Part of the debate – in the House of Commons at on 26 April 1922.

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Photo of Lieut-Colonel Leo Amery Lieut-Colonel Leo Amery , Birmingham Sparkbrook

I beg to move "That the Bill be now read a Second time."

Before dealing with the actual provisions of the Measure now before the House, it may be convenient if I summarise the successive steps which have led to its introduction and refer briefly to the record of three years of work and practical experience upon which it is based. The need for a more direct interest on the part of the Government of this country in the movement of its citizens overseas was strongly urged both by the Dominions Royal Commission appointed as the outcome of the Imperial Conference of 1911 and by the Committee under Lord Tennyson's chairmanship, which in 1917 investigated the problem from the point of view of the interests of ex-service men.

In compliance with their recommendations the present Lord Long, then Secretary of State for the Colonies, set up shortly after the Armistice the Government Emigration Committee, a designation subsequently changed to the Oversea Settlement Committee. This Committee, of which I have continued to act as chairman almost since its inception, is composed of representatives of the Government Departments chiefly concerned and of certain vitally affected interests, such as shipping and labour, together with a few individuals of special experience in various aspects of overseas settlement, among which I might perhaps single out the very important aspect of the oversea settlement of women. It acts under the general authority and control of the Secretary of State for the Colonies, and the Oversea Settlement Office, which carries out the actual administration of the Government's policy in these matters, is for financial and staff purposes a branch of the Colonial Office.

Our first duty, and up to the present our main administrative task, was to deal with the ex-service men. A very large proportion of these would, in the ordinary course, have gone overseas but for the War, but they found themselves after the Armistice precluded by loss of means and by the greatly increased cost of passages from taking advantage of opportunities which presented themselves under Dominion soldier settlement schemes and otherwise. We felt that these men had fought for the Empire as a whole, and that they ought not to be denied access to any good opportunity which the Empire had to offer, and we accordingly persuaded the Cabinet to include among the facilities given to ex-service men—and here I may say to ex-service women as well—a free passage for themselves and their families to any part of the British Empire. But this offer was subject to certain very important conditions—important from the point of view both of the ex-service men themselves and from the point of view of the Dominions to which they went. One was that they should have assured employment in prospect. We did not wish our gift to be a mere temptation to their own possible undoing. Another was that, from the point of view of the Oversea Governments themselves, they should be in every respect, both personally and in regard to the local economic situation, desirable immigrants. We have in fact entrusted the whole responsibility of selection in this respect to the representatives of the Oversea Governments, and no voucher for a free passage has been issued except upon the express recommendation of these representatives.

As several of the Governments have, in view of their own industrial difficulties, practically confined their endorsement to men willing to go upon the land, or to women prepared to enter domestic service, the numbers who might have availed themselves of this scheme have been very much limited. Those who have actually been passed have been less than one-third of the applications, while the numbers of those applying have, of course, been kept down by a knowledge of the conditions laid down. Even so, the numbers who have actually gone are not inconsiderable. The total, up to the time when the applications still pending have been dealt with—the scheme itself was closed at the end of last year—will amount to about 50,000 ex-service men, making, with their families, a total of 100,000 persons. Thanks, to the precautions taken, only a very small percentage of these actually have failed, while quite a considerable number are well on their way to substantial prosperity. We have encouraged all those who received free passages to write to us, and while we have received some letters of complaint and disappointment, we have received a very large number expressing in the most enthusiastic language the gratitude of the writers for the chance in life we have given them. I have taken a few extracts, almost at random, from the last few batches of letters received. The first is from Canada: I wish to thank you for granting me a free passage to Canada. … Since my arrival I have done very well and am getting together a fair amount of cash which will be used to place me on a good farm of my own in a few years. If you had refused to give me the passage I expect I should have still been one of England's unemployed. I can assure you the chance you gave me to make good will not be wasted. Here is another: There is plenty of work out here on the land. I have the offer of five jobs for Spring but I have not decided which one I shall accept, not until my wife comes out. There is plenty of work out here for anybody that wants to work but lazy people are not wanted. They have no time for them. Here is one from Australia: My chum and I are going to apply for 2,000 acres between us and we hope to be settled soon after Christmas. At present I am up in the hush clearing virgin land for the plough. It is hard work at first but I am enjoying good health and having plenty to eat which makes it all the lighter. Here is one from New Zealand: This is God's own country, and I only wish more people at home knew it. The wife and I have been away in the back blocks for nearly twelve months and we shall soon be able to start a farm of our own, and, mind you, I came out here with £2. I have a lot to thank the wife for as it was really through her that we got our start as she is a good cook and that means everything. … This twelve months has taught me a lot, for I can now milk, shear, and do a hundred odd jobs that I never dreamt of before, and so would anyone who cares to come and try. Here is the last I will quote: I have succeeded in my new home, and have not lost a day's work, but there is something else I am wanting you to do. A girl wants to come to me, and as I have promised to marry her, I trust you will grant her a passage. [HON. MEMBERS: "Have you?"] As she is not a member of his family, nor an ex-service woman, the young lovers will have to wait until the House pass the Bill now before it, before she can secure an assisted passage. [HON. MEMBERS: "Agreed!"] I have read these extracts because I wanted hon. Members to realise something of the very human and personal character of this work upon which we have been engaged, and which I am now asking the House to extend. It certainly is the side of the work that appeals most to me, and has made me feel that, if ever any work I have taken up has been worth while, it has been this. It certainly has been worth while from the point of view of these ex-service men. But it has been worth while from the point of view of the nation as well. The free passages were, of course, open to all who served, without question of their private means, but in fact we estimate that fully 80 per cent. if not 90 per cent. of those who went were unemployed, or would have come on the unemployment funds. These free passages by the time the ex-service scheme is wound up will have cost something like £2,700,000. The same people would have cost the community in various forms of relief up to the end of the year, about £3,000,000. I admit there is not much difference between these two figures. The real difference lies in the fact that in the one case you would have them still with you, still unemployed, increasingly less employable, a permanent drain on your purse and a weakness to the nation. As it is, they are today productive workers, many of them well on the way to becoming their own masters, supplying us with goods that we need, and buying our goods and helping our trade under laws which give those goods a preference over the goods of foreign countries. Our expense is finished with the last passage booked. The profit will continue to come back to us in ever-increasing measure.

The ex-service free passage scheme has been, I believe, money well spent from the point of view of the British Government, even though it has paid the whole cost of the passages itself. That was a natural arrangement while the resources of the Dominions were completely taken up with the problems of the repatriation and resettlement of their own soldiers. But this obviously could only be a temporary arrangement. Any permanent scheme for Empire migration and settlement must clearly be based on the full co-operation of the Dominions concerned, whose need for population to develop their resources, sustain their defence, and build up their standard of progress, is at least as great as our need for the transfer of surplus population. That was the view of the Dominions as well, and in February of last year a special Conference took place at which the whole problem was fully discussed. The proceedings of that Conference are summarised in Appendix 5 to the Bluebook on the subsequent Conference of Prime Ministers (Cmd. 1474). This latter Conference, after full investigation, formally by resolution approved the proposals of the special Conference, the Dominions undertaking to co-operate effectively with the United Kingdom in developing schemes based on those proposals, though South Africa made it clear that the limited field for white labour in the Union would preclude co-operation on the lines contemplated by the other Dominions. The resolution went on to express the hope That the Government of the United Kingdom will at the earliest possible moment secure the necessary powers to enable it to carry out its part in any scheme of cooperation which may be agreed upon, preferably in the form of an Act which will make it clear that the policy of co-operation now adopted is intended to be permanent. The Bill now before the House gives effect to that Resolution, and empowers the Secretary of State for the Colonies and the Oversea Settlement Committee to co-operate effectively with oversea Governments or with responsible private organisations, up to the limit of the funds placed at their disposal, in any schemes that may be approved of. These schemes naturally fall into two main categories—schemes of assisted migration, and schemes of land settlement and development. The former category represents the natural extension to general migration of the existing ex-service scheme, with certain modifications due to the altered conditions and to the experience gained under that scheme. For one thing, we are now of opinion that not more than one-third of the passage money, at any rate in the case of adults, should actually be given as a free grant, though another one-third, or in special cases even two-thirds, will be advanced as a loan. Again, our experience has led us to assign very special importance to juvenile migration, to the migration of women, to hostels for the women, and arrangements for reception generally, and to the preliminary testing and training, both here and over- seas, of those who intend to go on the land. In this last connection, I should like to remind the House of the very valuable experiment carried out before the War by my Noble Friend the Member for Southend (Viscount Elveden) at his training farm at Woking, where he proved that a very short test is quite sufficient to weed out the men who will never make farmers, and to teach the rest at any rate enough to save them from feeling and from being thought fools when they come up against the most elementary operations of farm work on the other side. A valuable complement to such farms here would be training farms or base camps on the other side, to which newcomers would go straight, without the risk of being intercepted and diverted to urban pursuits in the great cities while waiting, and where they can learn something of local methods and conditions before being placed out among local farmers. Even with every training facility, however—and I do consider that in this respect we are still a long way from an adequate co-ordination throughout the Empire—it is doubtful whether, with an adult population of which over 90 per cent. is industrial, we shall ever get enough men to meet the needs of the Dominions for workers to open up their land. But we have here a vast juvenile population not yet definitely settled down to industrialism. To rescue these from overcrowded professions and industries, and from even more soul-killing blind-alley occupations, is one of the most hopeful tasks to which we can put our hand. A wonderful and still insufficiently appreciated work has been done in this respect by the child migration and settlement work of Dr. Barnardo's Homes and other similar institutions, and I am glad to think that, largely at the instigation of our Committee, Dr. Barnardo's Homes have now begun to extend their sphere of activities to Australia as well as to Canada. A similar and no less hopeful experiment is now being initiated by the South Australian Government, which is proposing to invite out some 6,000 boys between 15 and 18, and start them in life under selected farmers, with special arrangements for looking after their welfare and prospects.

Another even more important aspect of this problem is that of the migration of women. There is to-day a surplus in this country of 1,700,000 women. In the Dominions there is a small deficit of women, measured simply by the standard of the arithmetical equality of sexes. But measured by the standard of the social need for the services of women in household work, there is a far greater deficit, and one that in every direction is having a most prejudicial effect upon the social life of the Dominions. Here, too, much can be done by training, both here and overseas, to enable those without any experience to enter successfully upon domestic work overseas. In all questions dealing with the migration of women, the Oversea Settlement Committee has received invaluable help from the Society for the Oversea Settlement of British Women, a body formed by the amalgamation of a number of other societies interested in this work, and has, in fact, felt that the work of giving information, advice and assistance to women going abroad, and more particularly those travelling alone, can be far more effectively and sympathetically given through a voluntary organisation than through any Government Department.

I have indicated the general nature of the field which has to be covered by the schemes which fall within the category of assisted migration. But our experience, and that of all the Dominions, as voiced at the special Conference, convinced us that the capacity of the Dominions to absorb additional industrial and urban population, and, in fact, to deal with any immigration on a really large scale, is strictly conditioned by the opening up of their agricultural resources. The direct settlement of men on the land as primary producers must be the foundation of any broad policy of economic regeneration in the Empire. Consequently, we attach even greater importance to the second category of schemes—those that deal with land settlement and development. These will naturally be of very varying kinds, according to the very various conditions which they may have to meet, but, broadly speaking, they will fall either into individual settlement schemes under which men without sufficient capital will receive advances to enable them to set up as farmers overseas, always, as I hope, after a necessary preliminary period for gaining local farming experience; or else development schemes for opening up large new areas to cultivation by the clearing of forests, building roads and railways, and works of irrigation. Schemes of this latter type are in many respects the most hopeful from the point of view of dealing with large numbers of men without capital and without experience. They afford abundant local opportunity for wage-earning while the men are being acclimatised to local conditions. They facilitate settlement in groups and communities. A last but not least important consideration is that they ought to be relatively cheap.

For the carrying out of all these various schemes we propose to rely upon existing Government and private organisations. We have no intention of setting up any elaborate new administrative machinery, either here or overseas. The power to grant or withhold our financial assistance will be sufficient to secure that both the initial conditions and the actual arrangements for carrying out schemes will be such as to satisfy our requirements. The actual administration is far better left to the Oversea Governments, all of which have existing machinery which can be adapted or expanded to meet new developments or else to private organisations, whether of a business or philanthropic character. The House is, of course, well aware of the valuable work which has been done, in this connection by such bodies as the Salvation Army, the, Church Army, and the Young Men's Christian Association, to name only one or two among a great number, and the House can rest assured that the policy of the Oversea Settlement Committee, in carrying this Bill into effect, will be to co-operate with, and to rely upon, these voluntary organisations wherever we can. The Bill has, in fact, been so framed as to secure the utmost elasticity in operation in order to meet the wide variety of local conditions and personal requirements, and to test the possibilities of new departures and experiments, while in every case retaining the power to insist upon sound financial and administrative methods, and definitely to limit the extent of our commitment. At the same time, by making provision for 15 years ahead, it also provides that element of permanence and continuity in general policy upon which the Dominions insisted so strongly at the recent Conference, and which is so essential if there is to be true efficiency and economy in such very important items as shipping, and, indeed, in the whole administration of Government schemes of settlement.

Let me turn now to the actual finance of the Measure. It is not proposed to spend in the present year more than £1,500,000, and in view of the full investigation and discussion which will be required into every scheme that is put before us, I doubt if we shall be in a position to spend even the whole of that sum in the present year. The normal expenditure is fixed at £3,000,000. Of this total I estimate that about £1,000,000 will be required for schemes within the category of assisted migration. The basis of contribution for schemes in this category will normally be half and half, so that the total amount available both from the Dominions and the United Kingdom for this purpose will be about £2,000,000 a year. I reckon that the average cost per adult of passages is about £26, though I hope that figure will gradually come down. While the whole of this will not necessarily have to be furnished in every case there will, on the other hand, be many instances where we shall have to spend money on initial training and advances of landing money, and so on. I reckon that a figure somewhere between £25 and £30 will probably represent fairly the average cost per head of a migrant. On that basis £2,000,000 would make possible an annual assisted migration of something between 60,000 and 80,000 persons a year to begin with, and a considerably larger figure eventually if the repayment of advances is added to the fund for fresh assistance.

The remaining £2,000,000 of United Kingdom money would be available for assistance to land settlement and development schemes. Any estimate of the numbers which should be settled under these schemes depends on the particular kind of scheme adopted. It was agreed at the special Conference that the British contribution to schemes of individual settlement should not exceed an advance of £300 a settler, roughly speaking, about one-third of the minimum total amount required. On that basis it would be possible to settle about 3,000 heads of families as farmers for an expenditure of £1,000,000. On the other hand, block settlement schemes may yield larger results for a smaller immediate contribution. We are, for instance, considering at this moment a scheme, already agreed upon between the Australian Commonwealth and the Government of Western Australia, under which the latter undertakes to settle 75,000 persons for an expenditure of £6,000,000, provided that the Commonwealth and the United Kingdom each contribute a sum equivalent to one-third of the interest for five years on the successive instalments raised. This would cost us altogether, over a period of seven or eight years, £600,000, in other words, 10 per cent. of the total expenditure, or only about £8 per settler. These figures are, of course, not strictly comparable. In the one case we are dealing with individual owners of farms and with money advanced, which would be recoverable. In the other case we are dealing with the total population which would be settled in consequence of a scheme of development, and with an outright contribution. Still they suggest that where favourable local conditions exist these larger development schemes may offer the most substantial immediate result for a relatively small contribution.

4.0 P.M.

I think the figures I have given are sufficient to indicate that the amount provided under the Bill will enable the problem to be taken in hand seriously, more particularly if, as was recommended by the special conference, the amount is in later years increased by the sums recovered from the repayment of advances. I believe before very long we shall regard the amount now proposed as quite inadequate for so great and so remunerative a task. But in view of the difficulties of our financial situation, and of the need of gaining experience as we proceed, I am prepared to be well content with the present Measure as a substantial instalment of the larger policy of the future. In any case, our expenditure under this Bill will be strictly conditioned and strictly contingent upon at least equal, and, as far as land settlement schemes are concerned, considerably larger, expenditure on the part of the Dominions. The House will very naturally wish to know how far these Governments show any willingness to co-operate. There is, I think, in all the Dominions a very keen sense of the need of additional human, as well as material capital, in order to develop their resources and strengthen their national life. Where there is local or sectional opposition to immigration, it is based upon the fear of an influx of unemployed industrial workers into urban centres where there is often serious tem- porary unemployment. There is nowhere any opposition to the policy of land settlement and development, which is the main object of this Bill, and which can only increase employment. If the Dominion Governments have not already moved more actively in this matter, it has been owing to the very heavy burden which the War has left upon them, and which has been increased by the task of their own soldier settlement schemes, a task which has, however, in many ways prepared the ground for new settlement schemes. The prospect of some measure of co-operation by the United Kingdom means, I believe, that every Dominion will have an opportunity of tiding over the gap between the immediate cost of such schemes and their certain ultimate benefits. That was the view expressed at the Empire Conference by the Dominions and it was from this point of view that the Dominions so strongly urged upon us the need that we should give a lead by passing our own Act and by letting them know clearly to what extent we were prepared to co-operate. As a matter of fact, apart from the general pledge of effective co-operation contained in the Conference Resolution, several Oversea Dominion Governments are only waiting for the passage of this Bill to enter into definite negotiations. The Prime Minister of Australia has declared himself as prepared in principle to consider schemes involving—of course over a considerable number of years—an expenditure of £50,000,000, subject to securing satisfactory arrangements with the State Governments who own the land and would actually administer any schemes. The Western Australian scheme to which I referred just now would, if we could see our way to join in it under the provisions of this Bill, be only an instalment of a far-reaching policy of Australian development. The Commonwealth is equally ready to join at once in a scheme for assisted passages to any extent that Australia's requirements for population may demand. Mr. Massey, the Prime Minister of New Zealand, expressed, at the time of the Conference, his own readiness and that of his Dominion to co-operate both in schemes of settlement and migration on a scale proportioned to the smaller size and limited area of his Dominion. The case of South Africa, of course, is exceptional, owing to the fact that there is no opening there for white unskilled or semi-skilled labour. That precludes any idea of large development schemes or of a large volume of assisted migration.