ANNEX 2
Commonwealth
of Australia,
Australia House,
Strand, London WC2
10 September 1954The Department of Immigration in Canberra has,
from time to time, received requests that the documents of child
migrants should be endorsed as to whether they would be available
for adoption after arrival in Australia.It has however, been the
view of the Department that it is undesirable to ask a direct
question, for example on the LEM3, regarding availability for
adoption, as this may be disconcerting to parents who do not wish
to lose contact with their children and could adversely affect
recruitment.Furthermore, this would inevitably delay the preparation
of applications if the documents had to be endorsed in this manner.Despite
these objections, the matter has been repeatedly raised, and it
has been pointed out that frequently the voluntary organisations
in London already have information of a more or less definite
nature on their files when the children are presented for migration,
and that many of their papers could readily be endorsed in such
terms as "parent not in contact with child, probably available
for adoption".This office has therefore been asked to study
the matter further, and it is felt that the Council of Voluntary
Organisations might be prepared to discuss the matter and present
to us the views of the various member organisations. We are aware,
of course, that individual organisations may not be prepared to
consider the adoption proposal at all. In other cases the organisations
themselves might be prepared to pass the information on to their
counterpart in Australia, without actually noting it on the forms
LEH3 or to include such information on a supplementary sheet sent
to this office.If you would be kind enough to bring these views
before the members of your Council, their comments on the proposal
would be helpful and would assist in clarifying the matter at
the Australian end.
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