Give them dirty work

On one side a queue of dark-skinned men are trying to get in. On the other side a large crowd of white workers are being thrown out of factories. A large placard reads: "Foreigners are taking our jobs. Let's keep them out." Less than three weeks ago I found myself staring at this faded yellow poster hanging in the Emigration Museum in Melbourne. That poster was issued some 90 years ago by the Australian Workers' Union and plastered on many walls in its campaign to keep undesirable foreigners from invading Australia and taking over the jobs of its members.

After the outbreak of World War One, xenophobia against enemy nations intensified and the persecution of, and discrimination against, small groups of 'enemy aliens' living in Australia increased markedly. Sections of the anti-conscription movement argued that the Australian National Party in government was planning to flood Australia with cheap foreign labour, leading to knee-jerk restrictions against Greek and Maltese immigrants. In 1912 the Australian government excluded Maltese immigrants from the assisted passage scheme as a result of trade unions bans on "cheap labour". In the same year the government legislated the new White Australia policy called the 1901 Immigration Restriction Act.

Several historians of Maltese emigration show us how the darkest period in the history of Maltese migration in South Australia occurred in the 1920s when they were savagely discriminated against. The Australian government banned them from employment with the Australian railways. The irony is that a large number of them served in World War I. The majority of the Maltese suffered hunger and despair in spite of many of them being skilled artisans. Mr Gunn, the South Australian Premier, regarded the Maltese as "uninvited immigrants" and refused to help them to find employment. Many of them had to return to Malta or had to go to other states and found work on small farms run by fellow Maltese-Australians.

Dr Barry York tells us that the largest single group of persons excluded from Australia, after the Chinese, were the Maltese. A dictation test was used to keep the Maltese out. Dr York says: "The dictation test was neither an educational nor a literacy test. It was not really a test at all but a ploy designed to keep out individuals or groups whom the government of the day or immigration and customs officers felt were undesirable immigrants. The absurd and dishonest nature of the dictation test is revealed by a handful of cases: a Japanese kept out after failing a test in Greek, an English divorcee excluded after failing the test in Italian, 208 Maltese kept out after failing it in Dutch, and so on."

In the 1920s some Maltese were allowed into Australia to work in the coalmines as they were considered "good for dirty and menial work" and "a lesser evil than the Africans and Asians".

In the same period Maltese were classified as aliens in Canada too, although Malta was a European island within the British Empire and had acquired self-government in 1921. In 1923 Ottawa issued a Privy Council Order indicating the categories of British subjects who were to be allowed to enter Canada. That order specifically left the Maltese out while it opened the door to British subjects who hailed from Great Britain, Ireland, Newfoundland, New Zealand, Australia and the Union of South Africa.

Men and women who had the great fortune of being "preferred" in Canadian eyes came from France, Belgium, Germany, Switzerland, Holland, Finland and Scandinavia. The lower types who fell into the "non-preferred" category were those who came from southern Europe, including the Maltese. These were to be admitted only when there was no one of the superior categories willing to take vacant jobs. Moreover the "non-preferred" would only be allowed in if they were willing to work on the land and had a promise of work when they filled in their application to enter Canada.

Facing the challenge

A hundred years later Malta is no longer a sending country in the global flow of migration in the world today. We feature largely as a transit country in global migrant smuggling that generates Lm5 billion a year of profit for the organised networks of human traffickers. Each year from 2.5 to four million migrants move into other countries without the proper authorisation. Half a million migrants enter Europe irregularly every year. Nine days ago the Global Commission on International Migration set up by Kofi Annan published its report. Receiving the report at UN Headquarters in New York, Mr Annan explained that migration poses "one of our most important challenges" in the 21st century and stressed the need to manage it for the benefit of all - sending countries, receiving countries, transit countries, and migrants themselves.

"I agree with the commission that we are not rising to this challenge yet. But I am convinced that we must do so, in order to uphold common values and promote shared interests," he said of the study Migration in an interconnected world: New directions for action. The 85-page report sets forth six Principles for Action, ranging from ensuring that migrants enter the global labour market in a safe and authorised manner to enhancing greater co-operation among states to stem irregular migration while not jeopardising human rights. Without mentioning specific examples, the commission notes that the linkage between migration and security has become an issue of even greater international concern. "Recent incidents involving violence committed by migrants and members of minority groups have led to a perception that there is a close connection between international migration and international terrorism," it says.

When presenting its report the commission acknowledged the concerns of workers in developed countries, including the fear of losing jobs due to the influx of migrants. The commission points out that some countries had lost competitiveness because they had clung to outmoded means of production. It was important not to confuse issues of competitiveness with the mobility of people and turn migrants into scapegoats.

The commission urged each country to assess where it stood in the migration flow. It called on international organisations to analyse where desperate economic migrants were most likely to originate from; and said that the international community must provide debt relief and a fairer trade regime so that people "needn't jump into the Mediterranean to get better job opportunities".

The report calls on governments to consult employers, trade unions and civil society on irregular migration. It is crucial to combat migrant smugglers and prosecute them while protecting the human rights of their victims. The commission is aware of the negative consequences of irregular migration and that one way of dealing with this problem is to return irregular migrants to the country of origin or the transit country.

While protecting the victims of religious and political persecutions who have to flee their countries to save their lives, as a small country with very scarce resources we simply cannot afford to be overrun by irregular migrants. Thousands of families finding it difficult to make ends meet feel threatened by the regular arrival of these migrants in search of a better life. We must emulate Italy and Spain and have repatriation agreements with North African countries from which irregular migrants arrive.

The European Union must help us more to cope with this problem. A few days ago it gave Morocco Lm12 million to deal with the migrants issue. At the same time we must stem the rising tide of racism and populist posturing among us. While this kind of racist rhetoric reflects how lots of our people feel about irregular migrants, it does nothing to help us deal with this important challenge of the 21st century.

evaristbartolo@hotmail.com