PLANNED EMIGRATION
[To the Editor of THE SPECTATOR.] SIR,—May I as an Australian be permitted to comment on a few points in Mr. Ammon's letter in your issue of June 14th ? Mr. Ammon, citing the fact that before the War a large number of emigrants left Great Britain, seems to believe that an early resumption of emigration will go far in solving the unemployment problem. Perhaps it might alleviate the unemployment problem in England, but has it not occurred to Mr. Ammon that there may be unemployed men and women in the Dominions ? Naturally Dominion Governments do not, want an addition to their unemployed, and certainly they are justified when they desire to aid their own people in distress rather than supply plant, machinery, food, &c., to immigrants. When emigration takes place it is because other lands can offer better conditions than the homeland. It is for the very reason that the Dominions cannot at present offer better conditions to the people at home that emigration has ceased. At a time when the markets for primary products have been considerably narrowed by depression, tariffs and quotas, when prices for wool and wheat are at bedrock, when all the great primary producing countries are subsidizing the farmer to keep him on his feet, those who urge more settlement overseas are simply showing absolute ignorance of the con- ditions in the Dominions.—Yours faithfully, 855 Finchley Road, N.W.11. EDWARD T. LITTLEJOHN.
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