The Decline of Emigration Mr. Malcolm MacDonald's Inter-Departmental Com- mittee
on Migration has found depressing facts to chron- icle and few remedies to suggest. The tide of migration • within the British Commonwealth has turned in recent years, and more persons are coming home than are going out. Emigration has to be regarded from three standpoints, those of the emigrant himself, of the Dominion to which he goes, and of the Mother-Country which he leaves. The Dominions do not want our failures, and the best type of worker, who is doing reasonably well here, has no incentive to emigrate. But the latent resources of the Dominions will be developed by the influx of a reasonable number of competent settlers, and the migrants themselves should be able to make good if given a fair start from home and a fair chance by the Government of the country to which they go. But the Victoria experiment in community settle- ment is likely to check that particular method of emigra- tion for some time to come, and the Committee is on doubt right in its view that the emigration of individuals and individual families with the necessary desire and the necessary qualifications is what most needs encourage- ment. The proposal that the Government should bear up to 75 per cent. of the cost of the migration work of voluntary organizations goes rather far in the direction of generosity.
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