Coping with colonial immigration, the cold war and colonial policy: The labour government and black communities in Great Britain 1945–51

Abstract

The impact of immigration from the Empire, and in particular from the West Indies and some of the West African colonies, did not pass unnoticed by government departments during the tenure of the Labour government 1945–51. In their deliberations, this article argues, those departments were influenced by a variety of considerations all of which ultimately built up to a policy of inaction. Migration, the largescale movement of population, raised deep suspicion in the Labour movement generally. There was little understanding, knowledge or sympathy for the isolated black residential communities in the seaports that had eked out an existence for nearly a century. They were almost totally regarded as havens for unemployed black men, shiftless white women and half‐caste children. Race riots, adverse social conditions and the Depression had left these areas more remote and distinct from the rest of the nation. In the aftermath of the Labour victory in 1945 and the changes wrought by war, great efforts were made to...