CHINESE LABOURERS.
254
PAPERS RELATIVE TO EMIGRATION OF
2. As to the persons who should be permitted to take advantage of the bounty.-- Assuming it to be expedient, as proposed by your Lordship, to limit the permission so to do in the first instance to persons who shall have made special application to the Secretary of State to that effect; yet it does not appear to be necessary to restrict it permanently to such persons, or to those who are interested in West India property. This double limitation, if continued, might prevent emigration from being carried to any beneficial extent, and would aggravate the expense of conducting it. The British settlements in the Eastern Seas are, from their position, the resort of many vessels in quest of freights; and the commanders or agents, in the event of the current rates being low, and Chinese labourers disposed to embark, might be induced by an adequate fixed bounty to prefer a voyage from thence to the West Indies, though that contingency might not have been contemplated at the time of their departure from this country. If it should be found practicable to create a disposition on the part of Chinese labourers to remove to the West India colonies, the cheapest and perhaps the most satisfactory means of effecting their emigration would be by the ships which may convey emigrants to the Australian colonies proceeding afterwards to the Strait's settlements, with their water casks or tanks, and other preparations for passengers, calling at Java to purchase a certain quantity of rice at the source of supply. Although, therefore, some parties, who are suffering severely from the want of labour for their estates, and who are able to undertake the necessary expense and risk, may possibly attempt the commencement of emigration from those settlements, under the restriction prescribed by your Lordship, I submit that the permission may be advantageously extended, subject to such regulation as the respective colonies may think fit to impose.
3. Under this head I need only remark that I have no doubt that the Land and Emigration Commissioners will forthwith make satisfactory arrangements.
4. The propriety of ensuring to the labourer the benefit of any contract he may have made, and at the same time an option of rescinding it after his arrival, is readily admitted. But it seems absolutely necessary, as well for his own interest as that of his employer, that the endurance of his contract, and the periods at which he may be allowed to exercise the option of rescinding it, should be defined. On the one hand, the employer cannot be expected to have houses prepared for immigrants who may never occupy them; while, on the other, they cannot be competent to form a correct judgment of the new circumstances in which they will be placed until they have resided for a short time in the colony. In order, therefore, to encourage those arrangements which shall conduce to the more comfortable settlement of the labourer, and to afford him an opportunity of deciding upon his own experience, or rather to provide that he shall not be able to decide against continuing the benefit of his contract, except from his own observation, it is suggested that the contract should be made obligatory on both parties for six months after the arrival of the labourer, and that he should then, and at the expiration of the following six months, and of each succeeding year, have the option of continuing or rescinding it. Although the labourer would thus be bound by his original contract for six months, the employer and he might nevertheless enter into a new one during the interval.
With regard to the other point under this head, the ensuring to the person who brings the labourer a compensation in the form of a full bounty, if the labourer repudiates his contract, I would propose, in accordance with the foregoing suggestion, that the whole amount which may be fixed should be payable by the colony in the event of his doing so at the expiration of six months after his arrival, or a fair proportion thereof subsequently, according to the period at which he may act upon the option to terminate his contract, in conformity to the spirit of your Lordship's suggestion. Thus, four-fifths at the end of one year after his arrival, and two-fifths at the end of two years.
The full amount of the bounty ought also to be payable by the colony to parties who may introduce Chinese labourers without any special contracts.
The Right Hon. Lord Stanley,
&c.
&c.
&c.
(Signed)
I have, &c.
THOMSON HANKEY, Jun.,
Chairman.
Sir,
CHINESE LABOURERS TO THE WEST INDIES.
No. 6.
Copy of a LETTER from JAMES STEPHEN, Esq., to THOMSON HANKEY, Jun., Esq.
Downing-street, October 3, 1843.
255
I AM directed by Lord Stanley to acknowledge the receipt of your letter of the 13th ult. relative to the communication addressed by Mr. Hope on the 4th ult. to Mr. Neill Malcolm respecting the introduction of Chinese labourers into the British West India colonies.
The points on which you are desirous of receiving further information, or with respect to which you seek for a modification of the scheme as laid down in the letter which has been referred to appear to be the following:-
1. As regards the mode of fixing the bounty, you are desirous that a fixed and uniform rate of bounty should be substituted for the existing arrangement, which fixes a maximum payment subject to the production of their accounts by the parties claiming it. Lord Stanley will refer this question for the consideration and report of the Land and Emigration Commissioners. If their information be sufficient to enable them to fix upon a proper rate of bounty, his Lordship would probably entertain no objection to a compliance with your request.
2. As to the persons who should be permitted to take advantage of the bounty,- the question of extending the permission in this respect is one which must be reserved for future consideration. At present Lord Stanley adheres to the resolution which limits the conduct of the emigration to those who shall have made special application to the Secretary of State.
3. On the subject of contracts, Lord Stanley desires me to state that he has no objection to make the contract binding for six months; but the importer must, at the end of each period, be entitled to a proportionately diminished rate of bounty. He will, for instance, be entitled to claim four-fifths, but not the whole, at the end of the first period, and so on, with a proportionate reduction of one-fifth for each succeeding period of six months.
4. With regard to the payment of bounty in the case of Chinese labourers, introduced without any special contract, I am to state that there will exist no objection to it.
Thomson Hankey, Jun., Esq.
&c.
&c.
&c.
(Signed)
I have, &c.
JAMES STEPHEN.
No. 7.
COPY of a LETTER from Lord SANDON and Sir HOWARD DOUGLAS to Lord STANLEY.
LORD SANDON and Sir Howard Douglas present their compliments to Lord Stanley, and have the honour of transmitting for his Lordship's favourable consideration, the accompanying Memorial of the associated body of West India planters, and merchants of Liverpool; praying the removal of all restrictions upon the free import of labourers from all parts of the world into the British West India colonies, under such regulations as may appear to his Lordship to be best calculated to prevent abuses.
20, Fludyer-street, 10 August, 1843.
Enclosure in No. 7.
To the Right Honourable Lord Stanley, Her Majesty's Principal Secretary of State for the Colonies.
The Memorial of the Associated body of West Indian Planters and Merchants of Liverpool.
Respectfully Showeth--
THAT your Memorialists desire to call your Lordship's most serious attention to the distressed condition of the West Indian colonies, where many estates have been entirely thrown out of cultivation, and almost all the land has been cultivated without remuneration, if not to a positive loss, since the cessation of apprenticeship, owing to the want of continuous and steady labour.
228
CHINESE LABOURERS.
No. 6.
No. 7.
Encl. in No. 7.