About this record
This is an Act passed by the Australian federal parliament in 1901. It is headed: ‘An Act to provide for the Regulation, Restriction, and Prohibition of the Introduction of Labourers from the Pacific Islands and for other purposes’, known as the Pacific Island Labourers Act 1901.
The Act is printed on parchment, bound by blue ribbon and on the left side it has the red wax seal of the Parliament of the Commonwealth of Australia. Handwritten on the first page are the words ‘No. 16 of 1901’ and ‘(Assented to 17th December, 1901)’.
Educational value
- This document enacted a law to deport the vast majority of the Pacific Islanders living in Australia. This Act was part of a package of legislation introduced in the first year of Australia’s new federal parliament. The identification of the Act as ‘No. 16 of 1901’ means that this was the sixteenth piece of legislation passed by the federal parliament in 1901.
- In 1901, around 10,000 Pacific Islanders were living and working in Queensland and northern New South Wales. Most were employed under indentured labour agreements. The Act was intended as an instrument of mass deportation. It enabled deportation of most of the Pacific Islander workers as soon as possible after the end of 1906, but it encouraged them to emigrate before then.
- Only 700 were exempt from deportation under the Act: the only Pacific Islanders allowed to stay in Australia were those brought to Queensland before 1 September 1879; those under licence as indentured servants (people who worked under forced labour contracts); those working in ships’ crews; and those granted exemption certificates under the Immigration Restriction Act 1901.
- The Act also imposed progressive limits on Pacific Islander immigration. In 1902, immigration was limited to three-quarters of the number who had departed Australia in 1901. In 1903, the number admitted dropped to half the number of 1902 departures. No labour agreements were valid after the end of 1906 and, from that date, any Pacific Islander found in Australia was to be deported immediately—unless they had been under a labour agreement within the previous month. Moreover, if a person was suspected of being a Pacific Islander, it was up to them to prove that they were not.
- Pacific Islanders mounted a political campaign to oppose the Act. They sent petitions to the King, to the Governor of Queensland, to the Governor-General and to the Prime Minister. The only relief achieved was an amendment to the Act in late 1906, which liberalised the exemption categories.
- The final deportation of Pacific Islanders began in late 1906 and continued until mid-1908, taking longer than the Australian Government had planned. The official number of Pacific Islanders allowed to remain was 1654, but research indicates that the actual number was much higher, with around 2500 remaining in Australia. This means mass deportation under this Act had forced around 7500 people to leave Australia.
