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PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE
Reference
882
2 PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE, LONDON
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(4.) "Because the employers of labour in Mauritius are almost unanimous in con- sidering that other advantages are to be offered, if necessary, to induce the number of labourers who may be required to emigrate to this Colony; and that the right to a free return-passage, on account of many objections against it, should only be offered to the required emigrants as a last resource, and after other fair and equitable induce- ments shall have failed."
It is here admitted that the number of immigrants required cannot be obtained; and that additional "advantages" must be offered to secure them.
5. Because the discontinuance of the right to a free return-passage for the coolie emigrating to Mauritius, whilst it continued to be insisted on in favour of the Indian emigrating to the West Indies, was done with full consideration at the time, there being very little direct trade between India and the West Indies; and the distance being very great, the cost of the passage would be excesive, and the immi- grants wishing to return might not meet with ships, whilst the intercourse between Mauritius and India is incessant, and the cost of passage very much less.*
There is no doubt a certain amount of truth in the remark that the cases of Mauritius and the West Indies are not altogether parallel. A passage may certainly be much more frequently obtained from hence; but if it be beyond the means of the intending passenger to pay for it, it matters little whether their opportunities of doing so are more or less numerous.
6. Because the alleged difference between the cost of the return-passage during the six years from 1847 to 1852, and the cost thereof now, is not at all a conclusiva argument in favour of the re-establishment of a right to a free return-passage to take effect ten years hence, as
(1.) The cost may diminish in the interval.
Or it may increase, a contingency which the experience of the last few years would appear to render the more probable.
(2.) We are informed that the average of 11. 78. then paid by the immigrant did not include his food which was not supplied by the ship, whilst now ships carrying immigrants have to comply with all the requirements of the Imperial Passengers Acts, and to supply food, medical care, &c.t
The dissentients do not speak with certainty on this point, but I believe they are right. If they are so, however, the cost of a coolie's food between Mauritius and Madras by no means represents the increased cost of the passage.
(8). The rate of wages having since increased here, an immigrant, who now earna from 7 to 9 rupees per month besides food, lodging, and medical care supplied by his employer, may save the present cost of his return-passage, in about the same time as the immigrant who, in 1852, was computed to earn 5 rupees per month.‡
that
I am told by careful and well informed authorities that it is a mistake to suppose any considerable rise of wages has taken place, and that very few are engaged at rupees a month. But at all events the dissentients here speak as though the rate of the wages were the amount actually earned.
9
I have lately been going through a number of returns of payments made, as compared with the rates of payment.
"I have not yet been able to form a decided conclusion, but so far as I have gone it would appear to me that the amount actually carned is, on an average, about two- thirds of the nominal wages.
•
(4) The actual rate of the return-passage though taken into account at the time, was only one of the secondary motives for which the change was made.
Nevertheless, it was very strongly insisted on at the time.
(5.) The number of immigrants who have annually left the Colony during the last ten years, paying themselves the various rates of passage then ruling, has, taking into account the much lesser number of immigrants introduced, continued to be proportionally about the same as it was before 1833.
I confess I do not understand this argument, which, moreover, appears to me inexact. The amount of the departures should be balanced, not against the arrivals in the same year, with which they have nothing on earth to do, but with the number in the island who would have been then entitled to a return-passage under the old system.
• Report of Protector of Immigrants at Calcutta of March 5, 1862, paragraph 3, page 28. Despatch of Government of Bengal to Governor-General of India, March 24, 1852, paragraph 4, page 27.
↑ Letter of Mr. Caird. quoted by Emigration Commissioners in their Report of September 18, 1859, page 24.
Report of Mr. Caird of March 11, 1859, paragraph 4, page 29.
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Since the return-passages were given up there has been a marked diminution in the number of departures, and it is idle to say that there has also been during last few years a decrease in the arrivals. It is perfectly to, but it is nihil ad rem.
In point of fact, at no period in the history of immigration has a larger number of arrivals taken place than between 1850 and 1880.
In 1859; 20,038 male and 9,014 female immigrants were landed; in 1880, 31,648 males and 12,754 females.
To these a right to a return-passage would, under the old system, have scored in 1865 and 1866 in which years the departures were only a little under and a little over 3,000 respectively.
7. Because the reduced number of immigrants who arrived in 1871 and in the first four months of this year is due, not to the withholding of the right to a free return-passage, but mainly to the difficulty of inducing the proportionate number of females (40 to 100 males) to emigrate, and secondarily to socidental and temporary onuses, as distinctly set forth by our agents and as reproduced in Report No. 1 of the Immigration Committee of this Board, dated 5th February, 1879, annexed to Minutes of Council No. 4 of 1878, several of which latter causes have already cessed.*
It is here admitted that it has become no longer easy to recruit immigrants in India, but the position is an oathedra laid down that the difficulty is due not to the withdrawal of return-passages but to the increased proportion of female emigrants now required, and to accidental and temporary causes. may ask how is it if the increased proportion of females required be the cause of the Without going into these latter, I check to emigration to Mauritius, it has not equally acted as a check to emigration to the West Indies ?
8. Because our agents have suggested specific measures to surmount their difßi- culties in the way of recruitment, namely, the Calcutta agent.†
lat. That he be authorised to revert to the former "scale of wages, beginning at
5 rupees per month, with a proportionate increase to coolies who have previously emigrated.
2adly. That the proportion of females be reduced from 40 to 30 for every 100
males.
And the Madms Agent:
That he be authorized to offer engagements to females as is done by the West Indian and French Colonies.
The measures proposed by them having been approved by the Immigration Com- mittee, which has even added authority to pay bounties to females willing to emigrate, experience alone can show whether they will be sufficient or not to induce the required number to emigrate.
These "specific measures" are, I presume, the "other advantages" which it is supposed will compensate for the absence of a right to return passages.
The first is undoubtedly an advantage to the immigrant, as it restores to him the rate of wages he used to enjoy until a few years since.
The second can hardly be called an advantage to any one but those who pay the expenses of introduction, for a diminution of the female population cannot be an attraction to the intending emigrant.
There is, however, little need to discuss this proposal, as there is, I should hope,
no probability of the Immigration Commissioners being induced to relax their present requirements on this head.
The third proposal that engagements should be offered to women, seems to me as much to the advantage of the employer as the employed.
It is a measure to which I have no objection, but it will require a modification of
the law, for women can hardly be engaged under the same contract and exposed to the same obligations of daily work throughout the year under the same penalties as the
man.
The dissentients omit to notice that the agents of the Colony in India have also spoken and written repeatedly on the subject of return passages.
9. Because we are the mere inclined to believe that the reverting to the former minimum scale of wages, beginning at rupees per month (which we think was reduced to 44 rupees after the fever epidemic and the disastrous hurricane of 1868, and has lately been raised to its former amount) will produce the desired effoot, as those requisitionists who last year authorised the agents to offer that scale have obtained a fair number of the emigrants whom they wanted.
• Vide paragraphs 2, 7, and 15 of Report.
↑ Pangrapha 7 and 15.