PM Transcripts

FOR PRESS: PM. No 44/ 1972.
IMMI GRAT ION
Statement by the Prime Minister, the Rt Hon. William
McMahon, C. H. M. P.
The basis of the Government's irmiaration Policy has
been stated time and again. It is the one that will be adhered
to in the administration of Government policy. It is the one that
counts. I re-state it now.
First of all the aim of inmmigration policy remains the
preservation in Australia of an essentially homogeneous society.
That means a society that does not have permanent minorities of
people with extremely different backgrounds that will resist
integration in the long-term. We want one Australian People, one
Australian nation. This is no racist policy based on bigotry or Prejudice.
On the contrary it is a policy having the valid social objective
Of preventing the frictions and tensions which can come from
permanent enclaves and a divided nation.
Of course such a policy has not prevented and will not
prevent the entry of people of widely different backgrounds. But
the policy d1oes stipulate a necessity -for prudent caution as to the
volume and type of migration, with emphasis on the ability of
individual migrants to become integrated or assimilated into our
Australian society, within one generation at most.
In each of the last three years, over 9,000 people of
non-European or partly non-European descent have been allowed to
settle in Australia in pursuance of the policy I have stated. All
the evidence points to their having been industrious and successful
and to their having had no real p~ roblems of settlement. Obviously
the policy and its admrinistration have been successful.
PERTH, 4 May, 1972.