Child and Youth Migration to Western Australia (1913 - 1968)

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The British Child Migration Scheme to the British Empire lasted 350 years with the final group of children departing for Australia in 1967. British religious and benevolent institutions saw emigration as a means of creating opportunities for abandoned children, many of whom had been placed in institutions because they were 'illegitimate'. To be categorised as an orphan was deemed to be preferable to that of illegitimacy.

After World War II the concept of rescuing 'war babies' and underprivileged children from orphanages in war-torn Britain and offering them a new life in Australia was consistent with the broader immigration program. The belief was that children would be more adaptable and better able to be 'assimilated' into the Australian community.

The Western Australian Department for Family and Children's Services defined 'child migrant' in the context of Western Australia as children between the ages of 8 and 13 from the United Kingdom and Malta who were sent to that state between 1913 and 1968. Juvenile and or youth migrants were typically young men aged 15-19 years of age. They came without parents and had no family ties in Australia.

Unaccompanied child migrants came to Western Australia from the 1830s under various schemes. The Fairbridge Society was however, the first government-assisted scheme, with the first group of 13 child migrants arriving in 1913. World War One slowed the the expansion of the Fairbridge project and child migration was halted temporarily. It resumed in 1920.

In 1922 the Empire Settlement Act made financial provision for child migrants. By 1922 the Catholic Church became involved in child migration. The Christian Brothers established a farm school at Tardun and brought the first boys there in 1937. Between 1938 and 1939, the Christian Brothers brought 114 boys to their orphanages in Western Australia. The Catholic Immigration Scheme was a term used to describe mainly post-World War II child migration from Britain and Malta, to Australia.

Prior to World War II it has been estimated that 1,290 child migrants were sent to Western Australia, and of these, 1,174 went to Fairbridge. Immigration ceased with the outbreak of World War II.

The Fairbridge Society, the Catholic Church, the Church of England and the Methodist Church played major roles in post-war child migration to Western Australia. In 1947, the first post-war child migrants (nearly 500) were sent to Australia, most of them (over 300) received by the Christian Brothers in Western Australia. The Christian Brothers cared for children sent by UK Catholic agencies together with 300 Maltese child migrants. This order operated four institutions that received child migrants; Tardun, Bindoon, Clontarf and Castledare. Throughout the years of Catholic child migration, the Christian Brothers received approximately 1140 children.

The Church of England Society arranged for the emigration of 273 children to Swanleigh. Fairbridge received 346 post war child migrants. Eight children emigrated to the Methodist Home, Mofflyn. From 1947-1950 Catholic women's religious orders, the Sisters of Mercy and the Sisters of Nazareth, entered the field of child migration. Child migrants were initially sent to one of ten receiving agencies. They were Nazareth House (96), St Joseph's Leederville, (110), St Vincent's (30), Tardun (220), Bindoon,(224), Castledare (250), Clontarf (190), Mofflyn (8), Swanleigh (273) and Fairbridge (1, 520). In total 1,651 children emigrated under the post-war child migrant schemes.

Allegations of abuse suffered by people who were sent to Australia under child migration schemes were publicised in WA newspapers almost 30 years before campaigns to redress this began in earnest. In August 1967, The Western Mail weekend edition ran a three-page article on complaints of physical, sexual and emotional abuse experienced at Fairbridge Farm School Pinjarra, Bindoon, and Nazareth House. The issues were discussed in Letters to the Editor in the following week.