Alone on a Wide Wide Sea Forced British Children

Transcript:Alone on a Wide Wide Sea Forced British Children:
Alone on a Wide Wide Sea Forced British Children Migration Britain is the only country in the world with a sustained history of child migration. Only Britain has used child migration as a significant part of its childcare strategy rather than as a policy of last resort during times of war or civil unrest. The reality of this policy was to remove children, some as young as three years old, from their homes or care homes, from their mothers and fathers or carers, from all that was familiar to them, and to ship them thousands of miles away from their home country to institutions in distant lands within the Commonwealth. Many of these children were removed without their parents' knowledge or consent. Some names and birthdays were changed deliberately so children could not be traced by their relatives. Brothers and sisters were not always kept together and in some instances were sent to different countries. http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1438216/ http://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2015/oct/24/britains-child-migrants-i-was-told-i-was-going-on-a-picnic Between 1868 and 1970 around 150 000 British children were shipped from Britain: - Around 100 000 to Canada (around 11% of Canada’s current population is descended from British child migrants) - The rest were sent to Australia, New Zealand, Rhodesia and other British colonies By and large the children were destined to fill menial occupations and were very cheap or free labour, some were adopted by foster families. They were told they would be going to “a land of milk and honey”, “ a land of opportunity” Who were these children? Abandoned children Neglected children Orphans Children from poor families or from single-parent families Dr. Ron Sinclair (2011) explained these circumstances as a child migrant when he said: “My mother died very tragically….my father ultimately couldn’t cope with four young children in the grim years of World War II’s aftermath. There were no social services of significance in Britain….in sense we were going to a country that I would come to regard as a better country.” Why? Economic reasons: to relieve the burden on the British economy to pay for their care and help the economies of the receiving countries as they were used as free labour Moral reasons: to protect them from moral depravation at home, from poverty and neglect and provide them with a Christian education Colonial reasons: to increase the white population in Australia or Rhodesia http://www.childmigrantstrust.com/news/apology-to-former-residents-of-fairbridge-farm http://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2015/jun/29/fairbridge-farm-students-receive-record-24m-payout-for-sickening-child-abuse http://news.bbc.co.uk/today/hi/today/newsid_8285000/8285167.stm http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2507826/Brothers-separated-43-years-cruel-child-migrant-scheme-Australia-finally-reunited-Britain-desperate-search.html http://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2011/apr/02/britain-child-migrants-australia-commonwealth The British Government made a public apology to