Somebody's children: Child exports to the colonies

White Australia was founded by exporting convicts from Britain. According to Fabian and Loh (1980) until the 1820s, about a quarter of those convicts were aged 18 years or less. While this is now common knowledge, the full scale of child exportation from Britain has only recently come to public attention.

The interest that this former child welfare practice has aroused is largely due to the work of a social worker. Margaret Humphreys, who founded the Child Migrant's Trust.