273

A.—4,

13 June, 1911.] Accident Compensation Law. [Bth Day. Sir JOSEPH WARD : " That it is in the best interests of the Empire that there should be more uniformity throughout its centres and dependencies in the law of accident compensation." The CHAIRMAN : " More uniformity." General BOTHA : You cannot get it. Mr. CHURCHILL : You may not get complete uniformity, General Botha ; but you may get more of it. Mr. MALAN : If it is a pious opinion, we might agree to it. The CHAIRMAN: We will take that as adopted. Expulsion of Undesirable Aliens. " That where aliens are deported under the law of any Dominion to a part of the United Kingdom, it is desirable that some system should be devised whereby the Dominion may effectively co-operate in the measures necessary in the United Kingdom for the final disposal of such aliens." Mr. CHURCHILL : The last resolution is a very small matter indeed ; but at present we suffer some inconvenience, particularly from South Africa, of undesirables who are deported, coming in the ordinary course to English ports, and reaching the United Kingdom. We have a sort of unofficial working arrangement with the Union of South Africa, which gives us a certain amount of information about them. What we want is to devise in concert, without going too much into detail, some method by which when a Dominion deports an undesirable to a port in the United Kingdom we should have full notice that such a person is coming, in order that we may take steps to prevent our becoming a dumping-ground for persons who are not fit to reside in one of the great Dominions. The resolution does not commit the Conference to anything further than that we may embark on a discussion through the Colonial Office in the regular way as to some means of regularising the present system. We should really rather like the Union of South Africa to keep an agent at Southampton, and, perhaps, Canada an agent at Liverpool, to work in harmony with our immigration officers in order to secure the ultimate disposal of the undesirables deported. That is really what we should like, but if you do not feel that you could do that for us, correspondence leading up to the systematisation of the methods by which we now get informed of those events is what we should like to embark upon. General BOTHA : I agree that it is desirable to co-operate with the British Government in regard to the deportation of aliens to any part of the United Kingdom with a view to the final disposal of such aliens, and the Union Government will gladly enter into any suitable arrangement with the Home Government for such a purpose. When an alien is deported from South Africa all necessary information may be given to the Home authorities, so that they may know how to deal with such alien on his arrival at the British port. But it must be borne in mind that the vast percentage of such undesirable aliens come to South Africa, not directly from their country of origin, but from British ports, and that therefore the only course open to the South African Government is to deport them to the British port from which they have sailed to South Africa. We can, however, understand perfectly well the anxiety of the British Government not to be permanently saddled with this rubbish of the European population, and would willingly co-operate with them in any possible scheme that they may devise and submit to us.