KANAKA LABOUR IN QUEENSLAND. (Hansard, 8 August 1902)

*LORD LAMINGTOX

asked the Under Secretary of State for the Colonies whether a petition had been received from the Pacific Island labourers domiciled in Queensland, and, if so, whether he would cause it to be printed and laid on the Table of the House with any reply that might have been made, He pointed out that for a number of years several Acts had been passed dealing with the question of Kanaka labour. All those Acts had one general principle, to give humane consideration to the islanders. Every kind of check was imposed on abuses, and every desire was shown to treat those people with humanity. Legislation had recently been proposed, however, by the Federal Government which would have the effect of rendering those Acts nugatory, leaving the people suddenly without adequate protection. Feeling had been growing in Australia on this subject, and some of the newspapers had denounced the action of the Government as legalised murder and as barbarous. An Associaation of Kanakas had been formed to resist forcible deportation from Queensland, and a petition setting forth the grievances of these people had been sent to the King. Many of these people 1082 had become educated and Christianised; they had acquired land, and were engaged in industries; some of them had lived in Queensland over twenty years, and had married and settled down there; they were law-abiding, honest, and industrious. The Pacific Island Labourers' Act of 1901, it was alleged, provided no compensation, afforded no differential treatment for those who for many years had professed and practised Christianity, and whose children born in Queensland were of ages varying from infancy to twenty years and upwards; made no provision for those whose native islands had passed under foreign control or whose tribal lands had been alienated, and gave the islanders no voice as to the place to which they might be sent. By 1905 or 1900 it was possible that all the South Sea Islanders, to the number of 8,000 or 9,000, would be deported, and owing to the large number of persons involved it would be impossible to give adequate supervision. At any time there was great difficulty in landing them owing to the dangerous nature of the coast and the great distances between the various islands. As the vessels on which they would travel would be mostly sailing vessels, it would be almost impossible for the captains to he sure that they would be able to land the Kanakas in their particular homes, and if they were not so landed it was almost a certainty that they would be killed by hostile tribes. In the past this risk had been guarded against, for it had been to the interests of the sugar planters to take care that the men were returned to their homes so that a further supply of labour might be obtainable in the future, but there would be no such incentive now, as the whole of the trade was to be put an end to. This great safeguard in the interest of the islanders was, therefore, removed, and it was in the hope of being able to do something on behalf of these helpless people, to hundreds of whom deportation would involve misery, starvation, or death, that he brought the question before their Lordships. The lawyer who drafted the petition on behalf of the Kanakas had elicited the views on this subject of the Government Inspector of Immigration, who had 1083 een for eighteen years connected with this trade. The inspector said— I am quite in accord with, and can vouch for, the truth of the pleas set forth, and the statements made by the Islanders in their petition. Surely, in this twentieth century of Christendom the dawning Commonwealth of Australia will not be permitted to be sullied by such a crime as the forcible deportation of these islanders from our shores. Some of these people were now being returned, but one ship's captain— Captain Spence—had refused to under take the work because, if he were unable to land them in places of safety, he would not be allowed to bring them back to Australia. Captain Spence declared that the common promptings of humanity would not allow him to hand over protesting islanders to be murdered.