Federal Ministers See Red Bid to Undermine White Australia Policy
The article reports Federal Ministers' claims that Communists were encouraging Indonesian seamen and Australian waterside workers to undermine the White Australia policy. A Communist Party circular urged workers to boycott Dutch ships carrying military supplies, arguing that these would be used to suppress the newly declared Indonesian Republic and restore Dutch colonial rule. The Government resisted pressure to support Indonesian independence and insisted that Indonesian seamen remained prohibited immigrants.
# Federal Ministers See Red
## Bid to Undermine White Australia Policy
**CANBERRA, Tuesday.** — A Communist plot to undermine the Commonwealth Government’s White Australia policy is believed to underlie the strike of Indonesian seamen. This is the opinion of some influential Federal Ministers.
Members of a special Cabinet Sub-Committee appointed to consider the dispute say they have evidence that supporters of the Communist Party are the instigators of the strike.
The Government has obtained possession of a circular which, it is alleged, originates from the Communist Party. Full Cabinet is reported to have discussed the situation at length.
Ministers said that if they permitted the 1000 Indonesians involved to stay in Australia a serious step would have been taken towards breaking the White Australia policy.
Ministers insist that the Indonesians are prohibited immigrants, and that Cabinet cannot accept dictation.
An attempt is being made, Ministers say, to force the Commonwealth to declare itself in favor of the Indonesian Republican movement.
Ministers are unwilling to be involved.
The Government is seriously concerned at this evidence which, linked with information about the causes of other recent and current industrial disturbances, suggests a definite pattern of organised dislocation which, Ministers feel, Communists are fomenting.
A copy of the circular issued for “the Waterside Workers’ branch of the Australian Communist Party,” reported to the Government, states:
“Four Dutch ships in Sydney, the Japara, Elibrator, General Van Spek and Patras, are being loaded with stores for the Dutch Army, that are being brought from England for the purpose of waging war against the independence of the Indonesian people, and to convey the East Indies Dutch puppet Government to Indonesia.
“An independent democratic Republic has been set up in Indonesia and Indonesians are determined to resist going back to the old brutal and autocratic Dutch rule, where trade unions were banned and standards of living kept miserably low by force.
“Indonesian sailors have already refused to man a Dutch warship to shoot on their own people who have now got their freedom. Indonesian merchant seamen are refusing to man supply ships.
“The loading of these ships is a definite challenge to the democratic ideals of the Australian Labor movement. To assist the Dutch in any way is to assist avaricious Dutch imperialism against Indonesian democracy.
“The Australian waterside workers should refuse to load these ships.”