Marchmont home, Belleville, Ontario. A group of boys from Miss
MacPherson's home (London, England). April 1922. Photograph:
Canadian Government Motion Picture Bureau, Library and Archives
Canada C-034837. Public Domain. Today the Australia government
is apologizing to the "forgotten Australians" - those who as
children were in government homes between 1930 and 1970.
["Ordeal of Australia's child migrants" by Nick Bryant. BBC
News, Australia, published Sunday, 15 November 2009.] This
includes many sent from Great Britain to Australia as child
migrants in a great number of organized emigration schemes
supported by governments and other agencies. Thousands of
British children were also sent to other parts of the
Commonwealth, including Canada and South Africa and there have
been calls for some time for other governments to apologize,
including the British and Canadian governments. I was surprised
myself to see the comments attributed to Alykhan Velshi,
spokesman for Immigration Minister Jason Kenney, saying that