West After Suez

At the Canadian immigration center in London's Mayfair district, long queues of men, women and children overflowed into the street from morning to night all last week. Ordinarily, winter is a quiet time at Canada's overseas immigration bureaus. But ever since the Suez crisis, immigration offices in Britain have been stormed by a steady rush of Britons who want to move to Canada.

Although most queuers loyally denied it, statistics clearly indicated that the ill-fated Suez adventure had powerfully affected the Britons' decision to leave. The British emigrant flow to Canada averaged close to 50,000 annually in the first difficult postwar years, but fell off to a mere 12,000 in 1950 as British living conditions improved. In 1955, despite vigorous Canadian promotion, only 35,467 made the move. Applications picked up noticeably after Egypt nationalized the Suez Canal in midsummer, and when the canal was blocked and new austerity measures were enforced at home, the long queues began to form.

Canada, understandably, prefers British immigrants. To make sure that none would be turned away, the Canadian government planned to open two new offices in Britain (there are four now). Some 60,000 emigrants are expected to be on their way within the next year, raising Canada's total British immigration to 467,000 since World War II.

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