REFUGEES IN BRITAIN
Sto,—In last week's "Marginal Comment" Mr. Harold Nicolson makes out an impressive case for the indiscriminate retention of our refugee population. I do not propose to criticise his conclusions, but I am constrained to find fault with his argument. Mr. Nicolson simplifies the problem unduly by leaving out the question of desirability of the immigrants. His arguments in favour of indiscriminate retention are: 1. That it would be generous on our part.
2. That our economy would be enriched by the influx.
3. That the refugees would prefer to remain.
4. That their children would be exposed to more favourable influences here than in their countries of origin.
There is another consideration and that is the welfare of our own posterity. This may seem a small matter, but that is just what is wrong, or has been wrong, with much of our legislation—the ignoring of spiritual values for future generations.
I hold therefore that the primary, if not the deciding factor in the deciskin should be the effect of the further dilution of Anglo-Saxon heritage. If I do not make my meaning clear I would ask Mr. Nicolson to imagine a situation in which our Government had to choose between 36,000 Norwegian refugees and a like number of Japanese. I cannot believe that his argument wriuld be as simple as in the present case. Of course if Mr. Nicolson considers the present refugee population a, comparable to the Huguenots he is entitled to his conclusicap. But he should have said so, for it is on this point of the desirable admixture that the case turns. After all, we cannot renounce "the august and precarious stewardship of the clean blood of the race."—I am, yours faithfully, H. Quarrotr-Miumn. The Athenaeum.
Sus,—I am a German Jewish refugee from Nazi oppression and I have been serving in H.M. Forces since January, 1940. I read the article by Harold Nicolson with great interest and I beg to correct a slight inaccuracy which the article seems to convey. Before the general internment in May, 1940, some 3,500 refugees had joined the Pioneer Corps, starting in November, 1939. Eighty per cent, of them went to France and were evacuated in the nick of time. None of the Pioneers was of course interned in 1940 and they are rather proud of it.—Yours faithfully, . F. M.
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