WITHIN THE FAMILY?
SIR,—Mr. Paul Lynch deserved to have Mr. Mug- geridge drag the second skeleton out of Australia's cupboard, viz., the Aboriginals.
When 1 was at the University in Sydney a few years ago the 'White Australia' policy and the plight of the Aboriginals were constant topics of conversa- tion and heated discussion, and many of us de- veloped a deep conscience on these matters. In our university of 8.500 there were about 1,500 Asian students, encouraged to study there by the Govern- ment, and in some cases given financial support under the Colombo Plan. Some of them liked Australia sufficiently to want to stay, but of course they were not allowed to. You can imagine the impossibility of answering the question of an Asian fellow student. 'Why?'
The reception given to Asian students by the general public was fairly good—after all we have had a Chinese minority group ever since the gold rush days, and although there seems to have been little intermarriage, there is no friction. Nevertheless Australian liberals are rather doubtful of the ability of their fellow Australians to digest large numbers of Asian immigrants in a short time. Support is growing for a relaxation of the policy, although a quota system is recognised as being just as much a colour bar as total prohibition. But at least it would extend the process of education from the universities to the general public, and pave the way for greater changes later.
The poor Aboriginals suffer more from neglect than anything else. Most Australians live in the cities, where you just don't see Aboriginals. In some of the more remote areas of New South Wales I understand that clumsy attempts at 'civilisation' of Aboriginals have resulted in discrimination on the part of townspeople, and this is disturbing. But the big problem is apathy, not discrimination.
I am sure that if the Government were to take a strong lead in bringing Aboriginals into full citizen- ship there would be no opposition from the general public. 1 remember getting strong support for such a proposal as a university delegate to a Liberal Party convention in Sydney, and such conventions could hardly be described as radical! I hope that Mr. Muggeridge and other readers will not judge Australia from the over-ready defence of Mr. Paul Lynch, or the somewhat dated views and reactions of our revered Mr. Menzies. There are many thousands of us coming abroad to have a look at the.world, and sometimes we are surprised to lind ourselves less insular than many people on this side.--Yours faithfully,
3. J. CARLTON
Previous page
