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tence, and subsequent conduct. Full details of this scheme, which is now in full operation, will be found in the Parliamentary Papers of 1843, No. 159. The four principal clauses were—
1. The Probation Gangs, working entirely under Government with- out pay.
2. The Probation Pass-holders, allowed to find employment for themselves under certain restrictions as to superintendence, and the witholding a portion of their wages.
3. The Ticket-of-Leave Men, unfettered in most respects, but hold- ing a revocable conditional pardon.
4. Those holding conditional pardons.
This system proceeded obviously on the assumption, in which we thought ourselves borne out, that the convicts, as they emerged from the earlier stages, would have no difficulty in finding remunerating em- ployment in private service. Unhappily this expectation has not been realized; chiefly, I believe, on account of the introduction of the system just at the time of extensive depreciation of all property in the colony; and it is not to be denied that the practical operation of some of the measures adopted in reference to transportation have aggravated the distress of the colonists.
I will endeavour to point out the mode in which the system has worked. the effects it has produced, and to consider the remedies which have suggested themselves to me, or have been recommended by the local authorities.
The Comptroller-General took charge of the new system under my instructions on 27th September, 1843.
In November, 1843, private and confidential despatches gave the most lamentable and revolting accounts of the state of the probation gangs. They were such as had their origin in the congregation of large masses of male convicts, under very imperfect superintendence, with arrangements which admitted of little or no regard to decency, and wholly destitute of anything like religious or moral instruction; for although in some cases there were schoolmasters (often convicts), it is a lanientable fact, that up to the commencement of the year 1843 no single clergyman of any persuasion had been attached to any of the convict gangs; and the only provision made by this country for the religious instruction of her annual thousands of convicts consisted of a vote by Parliament in 1841 of 12001., and in 1842 of 18007.
The result, as might have been expected, was universal contamina- tion of the most fearful character; and the accounts of the state of the temale prisoners were even more disgustingly revolting than those of the males.
I am happy to say, that in this respect at least, if we may trust the reports of the Governor and the Comptroller-General of Con- victs, great improvement has taken place. The Governor does not
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report, in as much detail as I should have desired, the physical means adopted of guarding against the grosser immoralities, and I propose to call on him for more minute information on this head, and to make some suggestions to him; but he reports that four stations are in progress, in which the Separate System will be introduced, and he states generally, that there is not now a gang without its library and its religious instructor or free schoolmaster; that the conduct of the men
is generally orderly, and such as not to call for any extension of the period of gang probation.
The number of the gangs is twenty, the number of convicts employed in them is about 8000. They are employed in quarrying stone, making roads, clearing wild land, and in raising provisions for their own support. This last occupation is heavily complained of by the colonists, as not only depriving them of the advantage of the heavy commissariat demands for supplies, but as likely to enter into competi- tion with them for the sale of surplus produce. This application of labour, though it has not as yet produced any material effect (the large reduction of not less than 98,700, which is expected in the present year, being attributable to other causes) has yet been much complained of by the colonists, as likely to carry still lower the already great depression of agricultural produce (wheat being at 33. 6d. per bushel),
and thus to render the landholders less able to give employment to the large and yearly increasing population thrown upon them.
I may in this place state the financial condition and prospects of Van Diemen's Land, as bearing directly on the point at which, if at all, the system will break down, viz., the ability to find remunerating employment for the numbers annually thrown upon their own resources. It appears by the annual estimates that the following were the amounts of revenue and expenditure, and the balances for or against the colony in the years 1841, 1842, and 1843, respectively, and that the estimates for the years 1844 and 1845 exhibit the following prospect:
Revenue.
Expenditure.
Balance,
Deficiency.
1841
1842
£ 转 d. 170,895 13 4 220.119 11 2*
1843
153,467 1 10
1844
1845
118,785 2 10t 102.185 0 0
£ 5. d. 146,065 19 1 185,071 15 2 150,776 19 () 164,064 0 116,664 5 7
£ 3. d. 76.407 11 2 35,947 16 0 2,690 2 10
£
5.
st.
43.278 2 10
14.497 5 7
£59,758 2 9
Probable deficiency on 31 December, 1845
Including balance of previous year.
+ These are estimates made in July, 1844, the actual revenue and expenditure for
1844 being as yet unknown.
It will be observed that this is the anticipated result, notwithstand-
ing a reduction of the expenditure in the estimates for 1844 of 12,5931.,
PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE
Reference :-
C.O.885
2 PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE, LONDON
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