["White Labor Question and Broome", The Hedland Advocate (Port Hedland, WA), Saturday 06 May 1911, page 10]
[In accordance with our established policy of giving all sides a fair hearing we publish this article, and are prepared to publish others on the same question, as we are of the opinion that enough publicity has never yet been given the pros and cons of the whole subject. --Ed.]
(By a Pearler.)
At Sea, pearling grounds.
April 26, 1911.
All my interests are sunk in pearling, my subsistence depends upon its continuance, and today the future looks discouraging.
Will the edict of the Commonwealth Labor Party (that white divers and tenders must be employed on pearling luggers after 1913, mean the extinction of the pearling industry in Broome? We have been told by speakers from the Labor Party in Broome that they will take little heed of the cry of a few interested pearlers against their efforts to expel imported labor from Broome in the interests of a White Australia. It matters not that imported labor on the luggers could never interfere with the gospel of a White Australia, while the master of each man imported is under a bond of £100 to the Government to produce that individual at any time he shall be called upon to do so. Neither does it matter that in regard to exports and imports, Broome must recede from third place into line with Derby and Wyndham: in fact, he will be obliterated, as Broome really only serves two cattle stations.
There are over 400 boats licensed in Broome, besides others licensed in Cossack and Onslow, the majority having one white man on board. Where are the white divers coming from for these boats? It takes at least three years to train a competent diver for pearl shell, and during the time these divers are being trained what is to become of the small pearler dependent for his living on his one or two trained divers? It is not possible for him to give up trying to make a crust while he trains two divers (who, in the first two years, at any rate, would not fish enough shell to pay for wear and tear), and he must give up the game.
The trained white diver, who earns big wages for a three or four hour day (now and again), under favorable conditions, will take a lot of persuading to come to Broome to work all day and every day, under any weather conditions, for a lay on the amount of shell he fishes.
Another view which seems not to have struck the agitators, who have never tried the game, is that diving for pearl shell in the tropics is not a white man's work. Most of our divers after four or five years' work are constitutionally ruined, and unfit for any other occupation. A great majority suffer from paralysis. I believe that were any disinterested person to have the crews of twenty luggers brought up before him he would have no difficulty or hesitation in at once picking out the twenty divers. An experienced eye can pick out a diver anywhere by his walk alone. There are presently two professional white divers in Broome, one permanently incapacitated, through the partial loss of the use of his legs, from anything but the lightest employment, while the other gave up diving for shell opening. Neither would take on diving again if the opportunity offered. It is one of the most dangerous occupations known, and white men should not be allowed to participate while other labor is available.
There are many other and forcible arguments against white divers and tenders, such as hours of work, wages, price of shell, etc., "red rags to a bull" for the Labor man, but the question of the diver is paramount, and if the white diver comes in then the majority of the pearlers must go out, and pearling on this coast, if it is at all possible under new conditions, will become the monopoly that it is at present in the Aroe Islands.
There are rumors just now of a royal commission, which every pearler will thankfully welcome, if the members of the commission can only be persuaded to see the actual working of the boats.
