How did Britain send more and better prisoners to Australia?

At the end of 18, the disadvantages of British primitive capitalism "polarization between the rich and the poor" became more and more prominent. Some poor people have even become "refugees" wandering around. Some of them | "refugees" retaliated against society in some extreme ways, and were finally arrested by the government and became prisoners. In order to punish these prisoners, the British government decided to send them to Australia. It's thousands of kilometers from England to Australia. In order to save trouble, the British government "outsourced" the work of transporting these prisoners to private commercial vessels, and some private ship owners contracted the work of transporting prisoners from Britain to Australia on a large scale. At first, the British government paid the shipowner's transportation fee according to the number of prisoners on board before the ship left the shore, and the captain was responsible for the daily life of the prisoners on the way and safely transporting the prisoners to Australia. At that time, most of the ships transporting prisoners were converted from some dilapidated cargo ships, with poor equipment, few medical drugs and no doctors. In order to make huge profits, shipowners load as many people as possible, resulting in crowded cabins and turbid air. Private ship owners get their money according to the number of people before the ship leaves the shore. They don't care whether these prisoners can cross the ocean and reach Australia alive. Some ship owners try their best to abuse prisoners in order to reduce costs and chase huge profits, and even deliberately cut off water and food. This is a typical case of a good system turning bad people into good people.

A few years later, the British government was surprised to find that the average death rate of prisoners transported to Australia was as high as 12%, of which 424 prisoners were transported by one ship, and 158 died halfway, with a death rate as high as 37%! In view of the high death rate of prisoners, the British government decided to send a government official on each transport ship to supervise the captain's transport behavior, and equipped the accompanying officials with the most advanced Browning pistol at that time. At the same time, the living standards of the prisoners on board were set so harshly that every ship was equipped with doctors. At the beginning of the implementation of the above measures, the abuse of rights by shipowners was curbed, and the supervision of government officials seemed to be effective. However, things soon changed. The sinister environment of long-term ocean voyage and the temptation of money tempted the captain to take risks. They bribed the accompanying officials with money and threw the officials who didn't want to go with the flow into the sea. It is said that some supervisory officials and doctors on board died of unknown reasons. Faced with the sinister environment and attractive money, most of the accompanying officials chose to go along. As a result, supervision began to fail and the captain's abuse of power became more and more serious. It is said that the British government has also adopted a new method of moral education. They put those private shipowners together for training, educating them not to value money more than life, asking them to cherish life and understand the importance of transporting prisoners (that is to say, transporting prisoners to Australia is to develop Australia and is a long-term plan of British immigration policy). However, the situation has not improved, and the death rate of prisoners is still high. Later, the British government discovered the disadvantages of the system of transporting prisoners and thought of a clever solution. They no longer send accompanying supervision officials, nor do they pay the freight before the ship leaves the shore. Instead, the captain's transportation expenses are paid according to the number and physique of prisoners who arrive in Australia. In this way, in order to get the full freight, those private ship owners must take good care of every prisoner on the way, so as not to let the prisoner weigh less than before departure. If the prisoner dies or loses weight, the British government will pay less freight. It is said that some ship owners take the initiative to ask doctors to accompany the ship, prepare medicines on board, improve the living conditions of prisoners, and let every prisoner arrive in Australia as healthily as possible. According to statistics, since the implementation of the "payment by arrival" method, the death rate of prisoners has dropped below 1%, and some ships have even created a zero death record.