Concurrently with the above events, back in England, the country was still reeling from the effects of World War Two, with rationing and shortages still in effect, and unemployment high. These conditions led to unrest in the population, with the brunt of their frustration beginning to have an effect on immigrants. Demonstrations began springing up, and in the ten years after the war, more than a half-million Britons emigrated to Australia and New Zealand. Another 400,000 went to Canada. Australia and New Zealand was so desperate for settlers that ship passage for the five-week trip was reduced to ten pounds for immigrants, who were put up in hostels and communal Quonset huts until they could find employment and housing. The fever was on, and masses of people were leaving the island nation. As native Britons were abandoning the nation, West Indians began filtering in. As the Britons left in search of a better life, the West Indians did the same. This added to tension in the country, and racism became more of an issue internally.
By 1962, more than 200,000 West Indians had emigrated to England, and the government was being pressured to enact legislative backlash. One of the first was an act which restricted immigration to British Commonwealth citizens. In 1968, a second act was legislated, with 74% of the population voting in favor of it.
In Australia and New Zealand, after the wave of English immigrants, the local government enacted several draconian laws promoting “White Australia.” While the immigrants were ecstatic with the employment and wages nearly triple what they’d been earning in England, mixed blood Aborigines were being forcibly removed from their families and handed over to white families or put into orphanages, and tens of thousands of children, both mixed blood and full blood, were institutionalized.
Meanwhile, in Canada, the Indian Natives were getting their fair share of discrimination. Government figures showed that a third of Canadian Natives were dependent on welfare, infant mortality was double the national average, and their life expectancy was one of the lowest in the world. In Rhodesia, 220,000 whites still ruled over a population of four million, and more than 70% of the country’s best land was owned by whites. While Canada’s secession from British rule was peaceful, a 15-year civil war was waged in Rhodesia, resulting in more than 30,000 civilians killed, and 48,000 whites left the country. War was finally ended in April of 1980.
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1 - ira
Nothing about ireland