4.3 Post-war Commonwealth immigration 1948-c2010

Question 1

Who came and why?

Answer 1

• The British government invited people to come and work in essential services and industries
• Meanwhile, conditions were bad in New Commonwealth countries, with high unemployment and low wages
• The British nationality Act 1948 said that all citizens of the UK and the Commonwealth were entitled to enter the country
• Because of this, Asians expelled from two East African countries, Kenya and Uganda, came to settle, as did Greek and Turkish Cypriots, many forced out by civil war in Cyprus

Question 2

What was their impact?

Answer 2

• Immigrant workers helped rebuild after the devastation of wartime bombing
• They helped to keep the health and transport systems going and provided much-needed labour in factories
• They played an important part in the economic boom in the 1960s
• Commonwealth immigrants and their descendants have brought massive social and cultural change

Question 3

What were there experiences and actions?

Answer 3

• Many who came from the Commonwealth planned to work temporarily to earn enough to send money to their families at home
• With the 1962 Commonwealth Immigrants Act, however, much changed
• The voucher system meant only limited numbers were admitted
• Many then decided to settle in the UK and brought their families
• Immigrants played a key role in some industrial struggles
• Racist prejudice and discrimination, as well as violence, and speeches by political leaders increased racial tension
• The racist National Front met organised resistance on the streets by immigrant communities and anti-racists
• There was increased tension over the policing of Black people and unequal treatment in education, employment and the rustic system, resulting in organised challenges to these institutions
• Black and minority ethnic communities found ways survive and thrive

Question 4

Why was there a shortage of labour after WWII?

Answer 4

• Many men of working age had been killed in the conflict
• Large areas of major cities had been destroyed by bombing, and workers needed for reconstruction
• The newly created National Health Service (NHS), British Railways and London Transport needed staff
• The government, afraid of the spread of communism among disaffected ex-servicemen, was helping people to emigrate to Commonwealth Dominions with large numbers of expatriate White settlers, such as Australia, New Zealand and South Africa

Question 5

Windrush - myth vs reality (Black immigration)

Answer 5

• The emphasis on the Windrush has led many in Britain to believe wrongly that Black immigration started in 1948
• However, the Black presence goes back hundreds and even thousands of years
• Moreover, there were already long-established Black communities in the port towns

Question 6

Windrush - myth vs reality (Gender)

Answer 6

• “Only men arrived on the Windrush”
• They were not all men: there were several women
• Many were ex-servicemen and women
• Some, with happy memories of wartime Britain, were returning with high hopes

Question 7

Windrush - myth vs reality (Government)

Answer 7

• “The British government expected the arrival of the Windrush”
• This migration took the British government by surprise and the arrivals were not welcomed by the authorities
• As the Windrush approached, it was shadowed by a British warship
• The minister of labour, George Isaacs, said in parliament: ‘I hope no encouragement will be given to others to follow them.’

Question 8

Windrush - myth vs reality (Migration)

Answer 8

• “The arrival of the Windrush opened the door to huge numbers of immigrants from the Caribbean into Britain”
• After the arrival of the Windrush, migration from the Caribbean slowed down: in fact, most West Indians were heading for the USA
• It only picked up again after 1952, when the USA imposed immigration controls

Question 9

Examples of discrimination/persecution faced by Black immigrants in this period

Answer 9

African and Caribbean men and women suffered discrimination on a daily basis and in all walks of life:
- Many hotels, restaurants and dance halls refused entry to Black people
- In the mid 1950s, fewer than 20 per cent of landladies, and only 15 out of 1,000 in Birmingham, said they would let their rooms to non-White people
- Notices went up on windows saying ‘No Blacks, No Dogs, No Irish.’

Question 10

Describe how some politicians and the press stirred up anti-immigrant feeling

Answer 10

• The Daily Sketch said: ‘For years the White people have been tolerant. Now their tempers are up.’
• Labour MP Maurice Edelman wrote a piece in the Daily Mail headlined ‘Should we let them keep pouring in?’ and the Daily Mirror called for greater powers to deport immigrants

Question 11

What happened to Britain’s economy by the end of the 1950s and what effect did this have on immigrants?

Answer 11

• By the late 1950s, Britain’s economy was in trouble, so there was stiff competition for jobs
• Immigrants were often blamed for the fact that migrant labour was no longer needed in large numbers
• Non-whites were singled out for attack by organised groups of fascists
• In 1958, there were serious riots in Nottingham, starting with an attack on a White woman and a Black man in a pub
• There was also major violence in Notting Hill, west London, when a gang beat up five Black men with metal bars, causing them serious injury

Question 12

The Kelso Cochrane murder

Answer 12

• In May 1959, Kelso Cochrane, a 32 year old Antiguan, was walking home after being treated at the hospital
• He was attacked by a White gang and stabbed to death
• Over 1,000 people, White and Black, lined the streets for Cochrane’s funeral and a collection was made to send to his mother in Antigua
• The killer’s name was an open secret yet no one was charged with the murder, despite family campaigns for justice even reaching parliament

Question 13

In which areas did most immigrants settle in London and Manchester and why?

Answer 13

Because rents were cheap, and for safety and security, Caribbean immigrants lived together in the poorest, most run-down areas, such as:
- Tottenham and Paddington in London
- Handsworth in Birmingham
- Chapeltown in Leeds
- Moss side in Manchester

Question 14

How did Britain’s relationship with the wider world affect immigration?

Answer 14

Two major developments - the outcome of WWII and the decline of the British empire caused mass migration from the ‘New Commonwealth’ Britain’s former colonies in Africa, Asia and the West Indies

Question 15

The impact of immigration controls

Answer 15

• The 1962 Commonwealth Immigrants Act stated that holders of Commonwealth passports no longer had the right to live and work in the UK
• Instead they had to apply for limited number of employment ‘vouchers’ which would mainly go to those who had job offers or with professional skills. These were usually White Australians, New Zealanders or Canadians
• Many immigrant men faced a tough decision in the months before the Act became law
• In the ‘beat the ban rush’ between 1960 and 1961, the number of the Commonwealth immigrants rose from 58,000 to 136,000
• If those resident in the UK returned to visit their families they feared that they might not be allowed back into Britain, so they decided to bring their families over to join them

Question 16

Chain migration

Answer 16

When people migrating from one region are joined by others from the same region who follow them

Question 17

What does the term ‘salt, soap, soy’ mean?

Answer 17

The ‘salt, soap, soy’ transition took Chinese workers from seafaring to the laundry business and then to the family-run takeaway restaurants that spread from town to town across the UK, alongside the ‘Indians restaurants that were mostly run and staffed by Bangladeshis.

Question 18

What did the 1971 Immigration Act do?

Answer 18

Replaced vouchers with work permits for specific time periods, so staying in the country was only temporary

Question 19

Why did many people emigrate the UK during this period? Why and where did they go?

Answer 19

• In the decades after the war, far more people were leaving the UK than coming in, emigrating to seek better lives elsewhere, particularly in the USA, Canada, Australia and New Zealand
• Between 1947 and 1972, half a million emigrated to Australia, helped by the government’s Assisted Passages Schemes

Question 20

What did the Royal Commission on Population recommend in 1949?

Answer 20

That the UK should take in 140,000 young adults to prevent a decline in population. The 1947 Economic Survey said that immigration was needed but ‘could only be welcomed if immigrants were of good human stock and were not prevented by religion or race from intermarrying with the host population and becoming merged in it.’

Question 21

What was the impact of Powell’s speech?

Answer 21

• Powell’s speech had a huge impact
• There were marches supporting him and a survey by New Society found that 75 per cent of people in Britain felt that there were too many ‘coloured’ immigrants
• Barbara Castle, a minister in the Labour government, wrote in her diary that Powell had ‘helped to make a race war inevitable’

Question 22

What were the terms of the 1968 Commonwealth Immigrants Act?

Answer 22

• Banned entry to anyone without a father or grandfather born in the UK
• If someone had British nationality from the days of the empire but none of their family had been born in Britain, they had no right to come
• This was designed to stop the influx from Kenya

Question 23

What was a ‘patrial’?

Answer 23

People with British-born parents or grandparents

Question 24

Why did large numbers of Kenyan Asians start to arrive on Britain?

Answer 24

• Newly independent East African governments were expelling Asian residents who had been brought over by the British 100 years earlier as indentured labourers
• Large numbers of Kenyan Asians with British passports began to arrive

Question 25

Enoch Powell’s ‘rivers of blood’ speech 1968

Answer 25

• His speech strongly criticised mass immigration into Britain, particularly from the Commonwealth
• He predicted that it would lead to civil war

Question 26

1965 Race Relations Act

Answer 26

Made some forms of racial discrimination illegal

Question 27

1968 Race Relations Act

Answer 27

Stronger and extended to employment and housing; its aim was the ‘integration’ of immigrant communities

Question 28

1976 Race Relations Act

Answer 28

Set up a Commission for Racial Equality to encourage better relations between ethnic groups; to use the law to prevent racial discrimination, promote racial equality and equal opportunity, and to raise public awareness of racial injustice

Question 29

Crime and Disorder Act 1998

Answer 29

Made courts punish crimes more severely if they were aggravated by racism or against a person’s religion

Question 30

What did the race relations legislation not do?

Answer 30

Address institutional racism nor even recognise its existence

Question 31

National Front

Answer 31

An openly racist political party that wanted to ban all non-White immigration

Question 32

South Youth Movement

Answer 32

• Following the racist murder of a young Sikh by a gang of White men on 6 June 1976, the Southall Youth Movement was formed to defend members of the community
• Two years later SYM and other groups organised a protest against a National Front rally in the town centre

Question 33

Altab Ali

Answer 33

• In 1978, a young Bangladeshi, Altab Ali, was murdered in East London, at a time when the National Front was increasingly active in the area
• Seven thousand people, mainly young Bangladeshis, marched in protest to Hyde Park after his funeral

Question 34

Rock Against Racism

Answer 34

• In 1976, a group of activists set up Rock Against Racism (RAR) to oppose racism by bringing people together through music
• RAR brought Black reggae bands such as Steel Pulse on to the same stage as White bands such as The Clash
• Fans danced together to each other’s music and anti-racism became fashionable
• In 1978, 100,000 people marched from Trafalgar Square to hear RAR bands in Victoria Park, Hackney

Question 35

When did Margret Thatcher become prime minister?

Answer 35

1979

Question 36

What are ‘sus’ laws?

Answer 36

The police practice of stopping people on suspicion that they might be involved in a crime