REPORT
ON THE
EMIGRANT'S INFORMATION OFFICE
FOR THE YEAR ENDED 31st DECEMBER 1904.
The Managing Committee of the Office was constituted as
follows:-
THE SECRETARY of STATE for the COLONIES (President).
Rev. W. OSBORN B. ALLEN. *THE HON. H. L. W. LAWSON,
*C. WALEY COHEN. M.P.
*J. J. DENT. JOHN MARTINEAU.
*HUGH E. EGERTON. Sir J. RANKIN, Bart., M.P.
B. T. HALL. *THE EARL OF STAMFORD.
HOWARD HODGKIN. Miss C. WEBB.
*H. C. M. LAMBERT (Chairman). ARNOLD WHITE.
The names against which an asterisk is placed are those of
members of the sub-Committee which supervises the ordinary
work of the Office.
Mr M. Jones continued to be Chief Clerk, and Mr. Walter
Paton, M.A., to be Editor of the Committee's Publications,
and Mr. H. E. Dale, of the Colonial Office, continued to
assist in the editing.
The following is a list of the publications issued by the
Office during the past year, with their prices:-
I.
Quarterly Poster - exhibited in all Post Offices Free
II.
Quarterly Circulars on Canada and the Australasian
and South African Colonies. These are sent
regularly to anyone desiring them Free
III.
Circular on the Emigration of Women Free
IV.
The following Handbooks on the Colonies:-
Canada price 1d.
Each of the above Handbooks contains a Map.
Professional Handbook: showing the necessary
Colonial qualifications for barristers and
solicitors, chemists, civil engineers, civil
servants, dentists, medical men, nurses, police,
railway employees, surveyors, teachers, &c. price 3d.
Emigration Statutes and General Handbook:
dealing with all British Statutes on Emigrant
Ships, and Emigration, Emigration Societies, &c. " 3d.
The above 14 Handbooks, with all the Maps, bound
together " 2s.
V.
Pamphlet on Newfoundland, with map " 6d.
VI.
United States Circular Free
Summary of Consular Reports (North and South America)" 2d.
Pamphlet on the Argentine Republic " 2d.
A list of public libraries, &c., where the Committee's
boards with their posters and notices are exhibited will be
found in Appendix I.
The actual expenditure during the year 1904 was as follows:-
HEAD OFFICE - œ s. d.
Salaries 988 19 9
Rent 292 10 0
Miscellaneous 19 15 2
BRANCHES -
Fees 60 0 0
Miscellaneous 35 6 5
---------
œ1,396 11 4
_____________
The rise in rent was due to a new lease of the
premises at 31, Broadway.
Of this total œ350 4s. 8 1/2d. was expended in the last
three months of the financial year 1903-1904, and
œ1,045 6s. 7 1/2d. in the first nine months of the financial
year 1904-0905. The expenditure for the financial year will
not exceed the Parlimentary grant of œ1,500.
Sales.
The receipts from the sale of publications at the Office and
its branches amounted to œ109 5s. 1d., as against
œ134 3s. 8d. in 1903. The total is exclusive of what has
been sold by the Stationery Office, to whom all orders
exceeding 5s. are sent, and through whom some of the
Agents-General, and others, order a considerable number of
books.
Correspondence and enquiries.
At the Office, exclusive of its branches, 13,250 letters
were received in 1904, against 19,361 in 1903, being a
decrease of 6,111 (or 31.6 per cent.). Of this total
11,396 were applications by or on behalf of intending
emigrants, against 16,387 in 1903. The number of personal
enquiries was 2,503. Of the personal enquirers 5.0 per cent
were general labourers; 20.8 per cent. were skilled
mechanics; 10.7 per cent. were clerks; 4.3 per cent. were
female domestic servants (for whom there is practically a
demand everywhere); and the rest were miscellaneous.
Canada formed the subject of the largest number of
enquiries, and after Canada, South Africa, despite the
depression which existed there during the year.
The total number of letters despatched during the year was
50,394, as against 55,503 in 1903. A table showing the
fluctuations of the work of the Office will be found in
Appendix II. It will be observed that the number of letters
received in 1904, although less than in 1903 and 1902, was
greater than in any other year since the Office was founded,
and also that the decrease in letters dispatched compared
with 1903 was proportionately much smaller than the decrease
in letters received. This latter was due to the policy of
the Committee in distributing circulars to public libraries
and similar institutions.
Emigration returns.
The Board of Trade passenger returns for 1904 show an
increase in the number of passengers of British origin who
left the United Kingdom for places out of Europe as compared
with 1903, the total being 271,621 as against 259,950. The
most striking increase was that to Canada, viz., from 59,652
to 69,744, but the other heading, except South Africa, also
show increases. The number of declared settlers entering
Canada from the United Kingdom in 1904 is given by the
Canadian Government as 55,913.
Fares.
The fares to Canada during the year fell from œ5 10s. to as
low as œ3 owing to a rate war, and there was a reduction in
the fares to Australia from œ16 to œ14. The ordinary rates
to South Africa, which had been temporarily reduced in the
preceeding year by one company, were maintained at their
ordinary level. The only Colonies which gave assistance in
respect of passage were Western Australia and Queensland,
where assistance was given to a limited number of emigrants
nominated by friends residing in the Colony; New Zealand,
where reduced passages were given to emigrants possessing
fixed incomes or a capital of at least œ50; and the
Transvaal and Orange River Colony, which continued to give
assisted passages to female servants selected by the South
African Colonization Society and a few other persons.
Assisted passages for servants to the Cape were, however,
stopped.
Canada.
The year was a very prosperous one in Canada, and there was
a great demand for farm hands. The harvest was good, and
the area under crops in the North-West Territories was much
greater than in 1903. The demand for mechanics was not,
perhaps, so great as in the year before, and the demand for
coal miners was only fair. for female servants there was
the usual great demand.
Wages generally rose, as did also the cost of living. An
investigation made by the Department of Labour into working
class housing accommodation showed there was a pronounced
scarcity, especially in the Ontario cities within a radius
of 70 or 80 miles of Toronto. Rentals have shown a marked
upward tendency during the last five years, especially at
Winnipeg.
Owing to the attention attracted to Canada, the Committee
found it necessary to issue a warning to say that cases
having recently come to the notice of the Office of
emigrants to Canada being deceived by extravagant promises
of advantages held out by interested persons or syndicates,
intending emigrants were strongly advised to obtain
trustworthy information with regard to Canada from the
Emigrant's Information Office, or the Canadian Emigration
Commissioner.
HENRY LAMBERT,
Chairman of the Committee.
23rd February, 1905.
APPENDIX I.
Revised to 31st December, 1904.
FREE PUBLIC LIBRARIES (rate-supported) where boards with
posters and notices are exhibited and the circulars
are distributed (in all 298). These are in addition
to the Public Libraries at Manchester and Swansea,
the Mitchell Library at Glasgow, and the Government
Emigration Office at Liverpool, and the Imperial
Institute, where the handbooks can be purchased and
where 32 notice boards are exhibited.
(The figures placed against the names refer to the number
of notice boards exhibited at the Head Library and its
branches.)
OTHER DISTRICTS.
Belfast, Cork, Dundalk, Limerick, Lurgan, Waterford.
