«“

... Tearing up their roots and bidding farewell, probably forever to

. all the thous-

and and one things which, for better or worse, make this “our country.’ ”

Why they

leave Britain

LONDON

HEN I mentioned to a

friend of mine the other
day that no fewer than nine
people of my acquaintance
were emigrating to Canada,
he remarked: “If I were you,
John, I would be just a wee
bit self-critical.”

Yet I can hardly be held
responsible for all of the esti-
mated 800 to 1,000 daily in-
quiries at Canadian immigra-
tion offices all over the coun-
try, nor for the 5,000 a week
at Australia House.

And, although I must admit
to spending hours in the vic-
inity of Briggs’ Motor Bodies,
I plead not guilty to having
in any way caused 46 Dagen-
ham families to sell up lock,
stock and barrel in the last
nine months and _ start life
anew across the Atlantic.

Moreover, since the Ford
Company’s latest mass firings
and the knuckle-under-or-we
bust-unionism-in-Briggs cam-
paign, there have been no
fewer than 500 emigration en-
quiries in the district.

But first we want to get a
bit more general picture of
the reasons for the great exo-
dus.

It was certainly a bit of a
shock to discover—before the
current rash of newspaper ar-
ticles and Gallup polls of emi-
gration—that in my own little
orbit so many had decided to
leave for the New World.

So through talking to them
directly where possible, or

By JOHN GRITTEN

making enquiries through mu-
tual friends. or relatives, I
tried to discover the causes
of the itch.

Were there any characteris-
tics typical of all of them?

Were there any common mo-
tives which had led them to
No. 61 Green Street, Mayfair,
where the Big Queue waits,
doggedly and, patiently
through the small hours till
afternoon outside the Canadi-

an Immigration office.

Two common factors immed-
lately struck me. All nine are
under 35 and most are still in
their twenties. This, it appears,
is pretty typical of all the
emigrants. “Go West, Young
man.” He does, and the young
woman of the mid nineteen-
fifties too. S

Secondly, none of:them are
ne’er do wells, ticket-of-leave
men, or the black sheep of
aristocratic families — of the
type that were kicked out to
Kenya at the end of last cen-
tury and inflicted on the Kik-
uyu and Masai. y

On the contrary, these peo-
ple will be Britain’s loss and
Canada’s gain. .

They are enterprising; else

‘they would not make the not

inconsiderable effort, espec-
ially those with families, of
tearing up their roots and bid-
ding farewell, probably for
ever, to relations and friends

‘and all the thousand-and-one

things which, for. better ‘or
worse, make this. “our. coun-
try.”

They are not hoboes, Klon-
dyke-bearded would-be gold-
miners, or wide-open spaces
addicts. They are sober, skill-
ed and earning comparatively
high wages here. And most of
them expect to carry on with
the same trade or profession in
the country of their adoption.

Let us look at some of them
individually and‘see what they
think. First, Robert, a rela-
tion by marriage. He is a
panel beater in an_ aircraft
factory, and lives with his
family in a council house in
avery. pleasant provincial
city where most of his, and
his. wife’s relatives also live.

He has two children aged
five and ten. He owns a car,
has no refrigerator as yet, but
has a television set and a wash-
ing machine.

Robert and family are fairly
comfortable, one would have
thought. “We have everything
we want,” he says himself. So
what made them come up to
London and, at. four o’clock
one winter’s morning, join the
Big Queue?

Why are they leaving for
Canada in a fortnight?

They have quite a long wait,
because when the numbers of
emigrants reached the 6,000-a-
month level towards the end
of last year the shipping bottle-
neck began to build up.

There is no single factor
which has influenced Robert
and his wife to. mak their big
decision. Yet among a num-
ber of. reasons he gives, one

thing seems to stand out—un-
certainty about the future.
“If I lose my job, we would
have to leave this house. to
find a similar job elsewhere—
or change my trade,” says
Robert. “And that would al-

most certainly mean a drop’in‘
« income.

There are no other
similar factories around here,
you see.”

And Robert, looking around
at what is happening in the
auto and aircraft industries,
is really uneasy. “Then again,”
he says, “take the differen-
tial rent of this council house.
As soon as the wife goes out
to work, or the kiddies leave
school, or we take in a lodger,
up it goes.”

Robert’s immediate com-
plaint is that since Suez he
can’t get gas for his car, which
he used for going to and from
work.

And what does Robert’s
wife think? “I’m afraid about
the children’s future,’ she
says.

“There’s so much war and
talk of war. At least there’s
no national service in Canada.
Of course, if there was an-
other world war it would
come there, too, I suppose:
But at least we would have a
better chance than on this
little island.”

So there you have the views
of one emigrating family.

*

But then Robert’s married
sister Joan and her husband
and family are going too. And
Derek as well, one of their
unmarried brothers who is a
skilled man in a glass factory
all within afew days of
each other.

There is a clue, I think, to
the exodus. It’s not just Rob-
ert and family, but Joan and

' Derek as well. ‘

Uncertainty for the. future,
yes.

But also what I would call
the “follow my leader” influ-
ence.

Then there is the case of
Kay, 22-year-old Irish colleen,
who has been working in a
London office as a bookkeep-
er. When she left Ireland three
years ago, she meant Eng-
land to’ be only a stepping
stone to places beyond.

Now she is getting married,
and Kay and her husband will
shortly be on their way to
Toronto. They believe they
will be able to save up more
quickly for a home of their
own than here.

Futhermore, hubby-to-be is
a civil engineer who specializes
in the widening of roads. His
opportunities here are very
limited, and he has. already
landed a good job over there.

Now we will look at Renee
and Miriam, both shorthand
typists single, young but self-
assured, adventurous and ‘not
over-enthusiastic about their
present jobs in quite different
firms.

Canada is reportedly crying
aloud for shorthand-typists
(they apparently get married
too. quickly -over there), so
Canada it is. Renee and Mir-
iam, although they only~ re-
cently met, drawn together by

_ the same goal, may go togeth-

er and share digs when they
get there.

Because they ‘don’t want to
be dependent on the obliga-
tions of an assisted passage,

they are looking for evening
jobs, perhaps serving in a cof-
fee bar, to earn their fare
money. :

So all of them have their
own particular reasons for go-
ing. But either behind them
all or in the forefront is mis-
trust, even fear of the future,
or present frustration at lim-
ited opportunities,

More than two people in
every five would emigrate if

they could, according to a Gal-
lup poll. These are not the

signs of a healthy society.

Will things be better
them in Canada? ~-

Will the 34-year-old Ford
machine operator who is going
out there to look for a job
before fetching. his family
over, and blames “the Suez
crisis and the recent industrial
unrest,” find the labor-em-
ployer tussle less acute over
there?

A recent London News
Chronicle article on emigra-
tion came to the conclusion
that the trouble lay in there
being too little of the ~“Love
one another” spirit here. Is
there any more of it, I won-
der, between Montreal and
Vancouver?

The wife gf another Ford
man, a 35-year-old machine-
tool fitter, says:

“We feel we are just not
getting anywhere for the
amount of work we do. When
we get any money we're
frightened to spend it in case
something unexpected hap-
pens; It’s almost impossible to
buy a house with the high rate
of interest.”

Will they find more stabil-
ity, will it be easier to own
their own home, when this
family goes togCanada soon?

I don’t know. The Canadi-
an government and business-
men want as many Britons as
they can get. So naturally,
they paint as rosy a picture
as possible of the prospects.

While wishing “good luck!”
to the emigrants, I am mainly
concerned with the loss to
this country of such skilled
and often talented young
people. 5

Tory MP Nigel Nicholson,
of Bournemouth, says that
“Britain can afford to lose 15
million people in the next 50
years.” That is either the
sand-muffled voice of an os-
trich, or of a Dismal Willy who
can only see_a future with a
contracting economy.

Britain cannot afford to
lose such a high proportion of
Cambridge graduates as have
announced their intention to
emigrate when their educa-
tion often state-aided, is com-
pleted. “7

Nor does the country want
to lose the higher-salaried
scientists who are escaping
from the ambition-sapping
high taxation of mediums
bracket incomes.

Whatever the Conservatives
may think, we -will want our
talent for the home-based ex-

for

.panding economy of a socialist

Britain, where young imag-
inations will be fired by the
wealth of opportunity, where
careers will indeed be open
to the talents and where there
will be security and ever-
higher living standards.

‘ Let those who remain be-

hind at least, not be daunted. .

There is a world to win still—-
in the Old World.. -

MARCH 8, 1957 — PACIFIC TRIBUNE—PAGE 10