§ MR. FELLI beg to ask the Under-secretary of State for the Colonies if he has any official information showing the number of deaths per annum occasioned by the substitution of black native labour for Chinese in the Transvaal mines.
§ COLONEL SEELYI would refer the hon. Member to what I said in answer to the noble Lord the Member for East Marylebone on the 24th instant.
§ MR. FELLsaid the Question did not appear on the Paper in the form in which he originally drafted it, and he asked if the figures did not show a much higher death-rate among natives than among Chinese.
§ COLONEL SEELYI have refreshed my memory as to the figures. In January, 1906, when the repatriation of Chinese began, the total number of labourers on the Rand, both Chinese and native, was 140,789, and the number of deaths was 396, giving a rate per 1,000 per annum of 33.6. In the last reported month, February, 1908, the total number of Chinese and natives was 170,000, and the number of deaths was only 346, or a death-rate of 24.4 per 1,000 per annum; so that it appears that on an increase of 30,000 the total number of deaths has been reduced by fifty.
§ LORD R. CECIL (Marylebone, E.)What were the respective numbers of Chinese in 1906 and now?
§ COLONEL SEELYThat, of course, strengthens my argument. The total number of Chinese in January, 1906, was 47,117, and the death-rate per 1,000 was 33.6. The total number of Chinese in the last recorded month was 28,406, or a reduction of 20,000, while the death rate was 24.4.
§ MR. MITCHELL-THOMSON (Lanarkshire, N.W.)Can the right hon. Gentleman give the death-rate at the present moment of the Chinese and of the natives respectively?
§ COLONEL SEELYwas understood to say that the figures he had given covered that point.
§ MAJOR ANSTRUTHER-GRAYinquired if it was a fact that the death-rate among natives was greater than among the Chinese.
§ COLONEL SEELYsaid it was unfortunately the case that there was a high death-rate, especially among some sections of the natives in the mines; but the total result of the action of the Transvaal Government and of this Government before they handed the matter over was a reduction of the death-rate by 28 per cent.