Annie wrote "Australia 1944
It is proposed that the Commonwealth seek out in Britain and Europe, in each
of the first three post-war years, at least 17,000 children a year (I.e.
about 50,000 in three years) suitable and available for migration to
Australia..."
Statement by the acting Australian Prime Minister, December 1944"
Please note that that was an Australian position and your Prime Minister
speaking in the days where you immigration policy was racist. Frank Forde
was for eight days as the 19th Australian Prime Minister.
As a Labor personality of the period 1917-57, he had the almost mandatory
qualifications for leadership in that era: an Irish-Catholic background,
humble beginnings, hands-on experience in the workforce, anti-conscription
activities in the First World War and early dedication to Labor politics.
Forde was an Irishman from Queensland.
Forde went to Christian Brothers College, Toowoomba.
Australia 1938.
"At a time when empty cradles are contributing woefully to empty spaces, it
is necessary to look for external sources of supply. And if we do not supply
from our own stock we are leaving ourselves all the more exposed to the
menace of the teeming millions of our neighbouring Asiatic races."
His Grace the Archbishop of Perth, welcoming British child migrants shipped
to Australia, August 1938.
"The tragic reality for many child migrants was appalling standards of care
which fell well below accepted standards found within British institutions.
Far too many children experienced practices and policies which would not
have been tolerated by British child care agencies in that era. Children as
young as seven sent to institutions in Western Australia were involved in
building works without adequate food or basic safety measures." The Child
Migrants Trust
Fairbridge Society was one of the prime movers in the child population
movement Kingsley Fairbridge vision was to establish farm schools in Canada,
Australia and England. His role was primarily that of benefactor, while the
experiences the farm brought to those who attended were primarily
educational and experiential. Fairbridge was a Rhodes Scholar from Rhodesia
and was appalled at the conditions of the thousands of under privileged
children in England with no future but poverty and probable degradation. He
wanted to transplant such children to the wide-open spaces in colonies.
The post war decision of the United Kingdom Government to ban the migration
of children led to considerable difficulties in the administration of the
Farm School at Molong New South Wales. The Fairbridge Society instituted its
family schemes whereby one parent families and two parent families were
assisted to migrate to Australia, the children being cared for by Fairbridge
until the parents had established a home for them. But this scheme proved to
be impracticable in New South Wales mainly because of the distance
separating the children in Molong from their parents in Sydney. The result
was that no more children came to Molong from Britain after 1966.
The racist policy that was Australia's policy can be summed up by the
Empire's poet Rudyard Kipling.
Take up the White man's burden --
Send forth the best ye breed --
Go bind your sons to exile
To serve your captives' need;
To wait in heavy harness
On fluttered folk and wild --
Your new-caught, sullen peoples,
Half devil and half child.
Now I have to find a place to sleep tonight.
Sinclair
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