A White Assimilation Policy

The Australian government preference was for children from six to twelve years of age.

Theoretically, we would take the children young and train them to become farmers, tradesmen or domestics. Two special considerations were that they would be white, and they could be ‘Australianised’ before merging with the community at large. 

Under the ‘Post-war Mass Migration Scheme’, representatives of the Australian government and a number of religious and charitable organisations made regular recruitment drives in the UK, but by 1955 the well was dry. In truth, large numbers of children simply weren't available for import, and at this stage Britain no longer had a surplus stock – the children would be needed at home where they could, in a few years, assist with post-war recovery.

A further complication was that in the years immediately after the war, the British themselves were beginning to realise institutionalisation was as bad as the Canadians had believed – this change in attitude culminated in the passage of the UK Children Act of 1948. The act highlighted the many needs of children, focusing on the need to foster children or arrange for their adoption rather than institutionalise them. This way they would have some chance of a normal life.

Despite the UK requiring minimum care standards for these kids, there were early hints in official correspondence that the British government would turn a blind eye to whatever happened out here.

Catholic, Presbyterian, Methodist, Salvation Army and Anglican church groups were amongst the busiest operators, but there were also several secular organisations involved. At some point, Dr Barnardo’s homes were unhappy with the way things were going and distanced itself from the scheme.

The stories of many of these children are horror stories – already traumatised by family separations and/or war experiences, they were sent halfway across the world. Some were given new identities, separated from siblings, told that their living parents were dead or disinterested in their fate, or conned into agreeing to a ‘better life’ – as if a child of 7 would have enough insight to make such a decision for himself.

Stuck in extremely isolated areas, some children were used as unpaid labour for building everything from office blocks to accommodation, and farming sheds. Amongst the most notorious of the institutions the children were sent to was Bindanoon, in Western Australia. It had such a tough reputation that some Western Australian courts used it as a reform school.

The British had hoped to send undernourished, underdeveloped or even mentally feeble kids to Australia under this scheme. Unsurprisingly, some Australian organisations complained to the government of the ‘poor quality’ of children they were receiving. Operations were subsidised by the British Government, the Australian Commonwealth government and state governments. The children were also used by some institutions as an excuse for fundraising, so there was little financial incentive to seek foster or adoptive families for the children.

Despite protests in Parliament and from the states, the Australian Minister for Immigration insisted that all migrant children would live in institutions, and would not be fostered or adopted out. He insisted he become the legal guardian of all of these children in care.

Their story was not widely known until The Leaving of Liverpool, a film based on the scheme, was released in 1992.

While the Irish and Canadian governments had already conducted inquiries which acknowledged their governments’ roles in facilitating these abuses, the subsequent British inquiry was – like the inquiry into atomic tests at Maralinga – designed to absolve the government of any responsibility and shift the blame.

A state government inquiry in Western Australia acknowledged that approximately 3,000 Aboriginal children had been stolen, and almost the same number of British children imported to that state.

The Role of the Irish Catholic Church in this business should not be a surprise in light of what we now know about the Catholic care system in Ireland. Yet there is strong evidence the Church was one of the greatest abusers of the child migrant scheme - many of the children were sent to Catholic institutions, and there was a strong desire on the part of many Irish nuns during this scheme to ensure the Australian population would always contain a good proportion of Catholics.