["Pearling Commission Report", The Western Mail (Perth, WA), Friday 08 September 1916, page 31]
THE PEARLING COMMISSION REPORT.
The findings disclosed in the report of the Royal Commission on Pearling will come as a surprise to no one who is acquainted with the conditions existing in the industry, or who followed the evidence placed before the Commission in the course of its enquiry. Even the most rabid exponent of the White Australia policy must find himself forced to admit that in the pearling trade he is faced with a problem which refuses to be satisfactorily solved by methods which express the views and wishes of Trades Union extremists. The report, in short, is a complete confirmation of the attitude and an entire vindication of the practice, adopted and advocated by those whose practical experience of the industry entitles them to speak with authority. If Australian pearls and Australian pearl-shell are to continue to be represented in the markets of the world, entering into competition there with similar produce from other regions, then, in the opinion of the Royal Commission, the employment of coloured labour, for diving at least, must be continued. The Commission is under no illusions on the subject, it does not hedge round its findings on this point with any kind of qualification; it does not suggest, or indicate any set of conditions which would render pearl-diving a suitable occupation for white men; it does not indulge in pathetic lamentations about the white man's limitations as a day-in day-out sub-aqueous worker--it confines itself to an unadorned expression of its belief that as a collector of valuables from the ocean, floor the European is a failure and the Asiatic a success. That the Commission (or some of its members) has not arrived at this conclusion without some searching of heart is evident from the terms of the report.
The unfortunate, not to say disastrous, issue of the attempt, on The North-West coast of this State, to utilise the services of white divers furnished an object lesson so illuminating and so cogent that the Commissioners find themselves impelled to state that "it is not desirable to disturb existing conditions or to make any special effort to induce the Australian worker to engage in the pearl-shelling industry." And by way of meeting the claim made in some quarters that white men could by training become as successful divers as Asiatics, the report goes on to say, "It is not recommended that financial assistance should be given by your Excellency's Government to in any way promote the industry by the establishment of a school for diving. If the European is, at any future time, to find employment in pearl shelling , the Commission seems to think that his opportunity will not arrive until invention has evolved a diving dress which may he used with the minimum of risk of life, or till diving as an occupation has been superseded by some mechanical device for finding and raising the shell. Such devices have already been tried in plenty on our North-West coast, and the scrap heap in every pearling town from Onslow northward contains discarded specimens of useless contrivances. It would be rash in these days of triumphant mechanism to attempt to place any limit to the possibilities of cunning combinations of metals and subtle power, or to lay down a line which the inventive ingenuity of man cannot overstep, but an instrument designed to replace the coloured diver, by doing his work equally well, and at no greater cost must include capabilities so nearly human that experienced master-pearlers have long ceased to regard seriously its appearance as being one of the probabilities of the early future. If the report of the Commission so far as the labour side of the general question is concerned, amply confirm the views of responsible men engaged in the industry, its recommendations as to the future conduct of the industry do not, in any material point, differ from the suggestions offered by witnesses both in Fremantle and Broome.
The Commission is seized of the fact, from indisputable evidence and from what came under its own notice, that any radical alteration in the present methods of winning the pearl-shell harvest would be doubly disastrous. Not only would white divers, under existing conditions, be pre-doomed to failure, but their failure would involve the total ruin of the pearling townships. These townships depend for their existence on the pearling industry. "Broome," to quote the report, "is the only town of any importance between Geraldton and Darwin, a distance of 1985 miles, and is entirely supported by this industry," and "the industry has an importance of its own in that it maintains a European population in centres where no other industry would be at all likely to take its place," and for that reason, "your Commissioners do not consider it advisable or profitable, to attempt by any drastic methods to transfer the industry from the Asiatic to the European." On the question of permits, the Commission has adopted, almost in their entirety, the views of experienced master-pearlers, and its recommendations in the matter of dummying and for the protection of the interests of coloured employees, appear to be on lines which are likely to secure the approval of all who engaged in the industry. The work which the Commission has accomplished cannot bear results until after the war. At the present moment the market for pearls
and shells is almost wholly in the Americas, but, with peace, the European demand will once more arise. For a long time past the uncertainty of the attitude of Labour towards the industry has hampered enterprise and prevented expansion, but now that a Royal Commission, appointed by a Federal Labour Administration, has brought in an emphatic verdict in favour of the continuance of coloured divers, there seems every probability that the feeling of security thus engendered will be reflected in the increased attention which will be given to the development of the pearling industry.
