Are Refugees an
Asset?
[This
is Page Three, continued from Page
Two and Page One.]
HOW
MANY WILL BE LEFT AFTER THE WAR?
We
do not, of course, know precisely how many further arrivals there will
be. But the Foreign Secretary, in his Report on the 1943 Bermuda Conference
on refugee questions between the British and the United States governments,
stated that Great Britain was continuing to admit about 800 non-British
war refugees every month. These, like most of the war refugees, will,
for the most part, stay in this country only to fight. "Nearly
all are admitted because they are wanted for the Armed Forces or the
Merchant Service of ourselves or our Allies. Nearly all of them are
people who would be repatriated after the war."
Hardly
any refugees were admitted for civilian work even when possessing rare
qualifications. Many already in Spain or Portugal were rejected
although their families were already in Britain and they also had jobs
awaiting them.
In
May, 1943, three concessions were made to meet hard cases. Subject to
security precautions persons were to be considered eligible for admission
if they were either:
(i)
parents of persons serving in His Majesty's or Allied Forces
or in their Mercantile Marines;
(ii)
persons of other than Allied nationality, willing to join His
Majesty's Forces and certified to be fit and acceptable for them;
(iii)
parents of children under sixteen who are already in Britain
and who came unaccompanied.
"But
six months later it was stated that the number of British visas authorised
under these categories had been only twenty-four, eighteen and ten respectively
or fifty-two in
all."
In
any case new admissions are not likely to do more than replace losses
through deaths and emigration. It is therefore reasonable to assume
that the totals at the end of the war will certainly not be higher than
140,000. Mr. Morrison's estimate of 120,000 does, indeed, suggest that
the number of refugees will be even less than this, since the total
is evidently contracting.
How
many of these will wish to stay? It is at once obvious that allied nationals
will behave very differently from enemy aliens. It will be best to consider
them separately.
Allied
nationals
To
take the former category first, it contains, apart from Czechs and Poles,
some 70,000 persons. Most of these have arrived during the war. They
only wished to find a temporary refuge or to continue the struggle for
the liberation of their own countries, and fully intend to return home
as soon as conditions allow. There will, of course, be some exceptions.
A very few allied refugee women have, for instance, married British
subjects and will probably remain. A few men have also married British
women: about 1,500 Dutchmen, 1,200 Poles and 1,000 Norwegians, most
of whom are in the Allied Forces, have, for example, married British
women during the war. Some of them may want to stay. Then there are
some young people who have built a new life in Britain which they may
not want to give up. Any estimates must necessarily be vague owing to
the scantiness of the evidence and to the impossibility of forecasting
post-war conditions; it can be suggested, as a guess, that the number
who will remain permanently will not be more than 3-6 per cent. of the
total, or 2,100-4,200 persons.
It
is probable that a rather higher proportion of refugees from Czechoslovakia
or Poland will wish to stay. Most of the 10,000 Czechoslovaks came before
the war and many of them have become settled. The Sudeten Germans, of
whom many were Jewish, may have other reasons for not returning. As
to the Poles, there was considerable emigration from Poland, usually
to France and America, in peacetime. And most of the Polish Jews suffered
from persecution even before the war and may not wish to risk a repetition
of the same treatment. Perhaps 10-15 per cent. of the refugees from
Czechoslovakia and Poland, amounting to 2-3,000 persons in all, will
hope to remain.
Germans
and Austrians
About
90 per cent. of the German and Austrian refugees are Jews. The majority
will probably prefer not to return to a country which has been ruled
for many years by Nazis who have murdered thousands of their co-religionists
and who have consistently preached racial hatred. Moreover, about 2,000
German or Austrian girls have married British nationals since 1933.
More of the political refugees will probably return, as will more of
the Austrians, the future independence of whose country was proclaimed
at the Moscow Conference. All in all, perhaps 12-16 per cent., or 6-8,000,
of these refugees (mainly Austrians) will want to go back.
Of
the remaining 42-44,000, a fair proportion, estimated at 10,000-12,000,
may re-emigrate after the war. These last will include refugees who
(a) intend to rejoin their families in the U.S.A., in Palestine and
in other countries, (b) refugees who have affidavits and definite prospects
overseas, and (c) youths who have had agricultural training here with
a view to farming in Palestine or the Dominions. There are thus 30,000-34,000
potentially permanent residents of German and Austrian origin in this
country. To these should be added 1,200 refugees of various other nationalities.
To
sum up, the number who will want to remain in Britain will, on the basis
of the above estimates, be between 35,300 and 42,400, or, roughly, 40,000
persons - less than one person per 1,000 British nationals. The conclusion
which stands out is that the numbers involved will be very small -equivalent
to the population of Dover or Macclesfield.
It
follows that it should be possible to absorb the numbers in question
without difficulty.
Do
we need them after the war?
Humanitarian
considerations make it imperative to solve the refugee problem after
victory and so to reduce the human misery created by Nazi rule
in Europe.
But
purely utilitarian reasons also make it desirable that the 40,000 foreigners
- including 30,000 German and Austrian Jews - who have been admitted
during the last decade and wish to stay here should be given an opportunity
of becoming permanent residents. This policy should be pursued mainly
for two reasons:
(i)
The declining British population trend would be favourably,
even though slightly, affected.
(i)
Their absorption is likely to have favourable effects on our
economic, cultural and scientific life.
For
the last twenty years or so our population has been failing to reproduce
itself. The small increase in total numbers which occurred during
this period was partly the result of an abnormal age composition - favourable
to relatively high birth-rates and low death-rates - which is bound
to disappear within a few years. Partly it was due to immigration. From
1932 to 1939 England and Wales had on the average a yearly net gain
of 65,000 immigrants; that is to say there were every year 65,000 more
immigrants than emigrants. Of course, only a small part of them were
refugees. During the Depression most new arrivals were British nationals
who re-emigrated from the Dominions and Colonies, but this return movement
had markedly slowed down during the years of economic recovery before
the outbreak of the war. The number of British emigrants from this country
simultaneously showed a rising tendency. In 1938 and 1939 immigration
into this country consisted mainly of refugees from Central Europe.
What
about the future? Is it likely that after the war our dwindling numbers
will be reinforced through immigration from the British Commonwealth
as they were in the 'thirties? In fact the opposite is very likely to
occur. The Dominions have decided to encourage immigration from Great
Britain after the war. Their rapid industrialisation offers powerful
incentives to British workmen with initiative. Moreover, knowledge of
the favourable economic conditions in the U.S. and the Dominions has
been spread by the great number of U.S.A. and Dominion soldiers stationed
in this country. We must therefore expect that after the war an adverse
balance of migration will result in additional losses of population.
Lord
Cranborne, reporting to the House of Lords (24th May, 1944) on the recent
meeting of the Prime Ministers of the Dominions, pointed out that he
regarded as a particularly encouraging feature of these meetings that
there was abundant evidence that all Dominions would like to take British
emigrants, so far as it was in any way possible. '' We have, he said,
"made it abundantly clear that notwithstanding the fact that our
population in these islands is tending perhaps rather to decrease than
to increase, yet on broad Imperial grounds, we do feel that we should
encourage and assist as far as practicable inter-Imperial migration."
Population
forecasts suggest that in the future the excess of deaths over births
may lead to a population decrease of about 20 per cent. within one generation.
British emigration to the Dominions may be desirable in the interest
of the Commonwealth, but it would undoubtedly aggravate the British
population problem. In order to offset this loss, the permanent settlement
of refugee immigrants who wish to stay here should therefore be encouraged.
The presence of a very high percentage of aliens in any country might
in certain circumstances have undesirable effects. But in Britain the
percentage is not high in comparison with other countries. We know that
the total number of aliens in Britain was very much smaller than in
other countries before the refugee emigration began in 1933.
Number
of aliens in various European countries.
| Country |
Year |
Total Nos. |
Percentage
of Aliens |
| Switzerland |
1930 |
355,522 |
8.7 |
| France |
1931 |
2,891,168 |
6.9 |
| Austria |
1930 |
316,982 |
3.9 |
| Holland |
1930 |
175,850 |
2.2 |
| Germany |
1933 |
756,760 |
1.2 |
| Great Britain |
1931 |
183,869 |
0.4 |
We
also know that by 1943 the total alien population in Great Britain (including
refugees, all permanent residents of non-British nationality, allied
seamen, etc.) had probably not risen to more than 290,000.
If
we allow for 100,000 refugees and for a number of other aliens who are
likely to leave the country after the war, Britain will be left with
an alien population not exceeding that of 1931, and less than in any
other census year since 1881.
Continue
to Page Four: WHAT HAVE BEEN THE EFFECTS?
Miss Rathbone,
M.P. House of Commons, December 14th, 1943.
'Continuing
Terror,' National Committee for Rescue from Nazi Terror. 1944.
Two hundred
and seventy-seven thousand, one hundred and sixteen persons were registered
with the police on March 31st, 1943. Allowance has to be made
for children not subject to registration, and for a number of persons
who have died or emigrated but are still registered.
