Immigration into the UK under New Labour
As with everything New Labour has turned its hand to, immigration policy under their "leadership" has been abysmal - yet the majority of people remain blissfully ignorant or else remain silent.
Increased immigration under New Labour hasn’t reaped a single benefit for the United Kingdom but has come hand in hand with a whole baggage of problems. Here I wish to raise some of these problems and query if anyone can produce any net benefits to the United Kingdom of Labours immigration policy. I must stress that it is not immigration I am here arguing against, but simply the ridiculous manner in which New Labour has handled the matter.
Health and Education :
The practically-unchecked immigration of low-skilled or non economically active persons is placing strain on our already under performing NHS.
0.5 million of the 2.7 million people who have entered Britain under Labour were not of working age, so they arer either too old to work – and so are a probable burden on the NHS, if not now in the future; or are too young; in which case they would be a burden upon our education system. A direct example of this buden is that 1 in 4 babies born have foreign mothers,double the rate of 97 and to a cost of £350 million.
The children of immigrants of whom English is not a first language place a significant burden on our overall school standards (translators, barrier to full education, diversion of resources, lack of testing and education records, mid-term arrivals etc).
As for the actual extent of literacy problems amongst those immigrants without English as their first language, Sir Claus Moser’s (Jewish immigrant from Germany, before anyone questions his motives) 1999 report provides the following graph titled
“ [English]Language skills of linguistic minority groups”
The graph was constructed using data from 1995, the difference between then and now of course being that there are a lot more ‘linguistic minority groups’ than previously (and as such, a greater impact on the education system). The figures are quite shocking, particularly the 40% of Punjabi speakers who scored zero.
While compared to other areas the impact of immigration upon helath and education is quite small, it is nonetheless a financial impact that could have been avoided with tighter immigration controls. Then there is always the pressure of simply having more pupils in our education system – even if all immigrants were fluent in English the added amount of pupils in our education system still increases the overall cost.
Housing:
Brown has previously pledged to build three million new houses by 2020 In Browns words:
"Putting affordable housing within the reach not just of the few but the many is vital both to meeting individual aspirations and to securing a better future for the country,"
However, according to the governments own statistics the population would have increased by 4.4 million by 2016 alone, up to almost 7 million by 2021. I’m sure I don’t need to highlight that 3 million new houses for a population increase of 7 million is not going to make the slightest dent in the market price of housing; nor does it do much to “secure a better future for the country.”
And for those who would point out that a lot of that growth must be natural, and not due to immigration; the fertility rate for Britain is 1.66; while the replacement rate for a population is 2.1 (One might even suggest that the housing “problem” would solve itself in the event of a declining population, but that’s a whole other topic)
We should not also forget that with our present population this small island of ours is more densely populated than China. If current population growth trends aren’t changed…well, I think I’ll emigrate
Economy:
New Labour would have us believe that immigration is of vital importance to the British economy, that the majority of immigrants are productive members of our society working in high skilled jobs. Not so, according to the National Institute for Social and Economic Research who using government provided data and other official statistics came up with this report. According to the report, of the 2.7 million people who have entered the country since 1997 only 20% were working in high skilled jobs. 1.3 million were not working at all.
Some would argue that migration such as we have seen under New Labour has been necessary for economic growth. Well apparently we can have substantial economic growth without migration – according to the Office of National Statistics net migration between 1971 and 1997 was minus 5,000. So, all economic growth in the mentioned time frame had nothing to do with net immigration.
And how much was that growth you ask? Well, the nearest figure I could find on the internet, from 1970 to 1998 put that growth at 86% (yes, measured in real terms).
The recent report from the House of Lords Economic Affairs Committee on the 'Economic Impact of Immigration' highlights some interesting findings, quoted below:
"Overall GDP, which the Government has persistently emphasised, is an irrelevant and misleading criterion for assessing the economic impacts of immigration on the UK. The total size of an economy is not an index of prosperity. The focus of analysis should rather be on the effects of immigration on income per head of the resident population. Both theory and the available empirical evidence indicate that these effects are small, especially in the long run when the economy fully adjusts to the increased supply of labour".
"This is not an argument for immigration on a scale which exceeds emigration and thus increases the population of the country. We do not support the general claims that net immigration is indispensable to fill labour and skills shortages. Such claims are analytically weak and provide insufficient reason for promoting net immigration".
"The positive contribution of some immigrants (to the public purse) is largely or wholly offset by negative contributions of others"
"Arguments in favour of high immigration to defuse the “pensions time bomb” do not stand up to scrutiny and ignore the fact that, in time, immigrants too will grow old and draw pensions."
"...the economic benefits to resident population of net migration are small especially in the long run."
For anyone wondering about the political persuasion of the Committees members, it included Lord Sheldon, Lord Layard and the Chinese-born-of-Russian-descent Lord Skidelsky.
Crime:
* Edit: Coleman report sourced-data is actually about crime commited by ethnic minorities, not simply foreign born residents, as Mongrel points out on page 2.*
Increased immigration has placed a large strain on our police service. Scotland Yard was £1 million over budget last year for interpreters; and in the same link you will also find that foreigners were responsible for the majority of murders in London last year.
The cost of all crime committed by non-Britons in Britain is difficult to come by due to lack of (released) figures; but according to the Professor of Demography at Oxford University the cost of annual crime committed by immigrants *only on individuals and households* is above £3 billion
According to the governments own statistics roughly 11,000 of our prisoners our foreign born, that’s out of a total of 87,000 - roughly 1 in 8 of our prisoners. The cost of imprisonment in the United Kingdom runs at £37,500 - £49,200, depending upon the figures you wish to use. Using the lesser figure, the cost of foreign prisoners in our jails runs at £412.5 million
To put these figures into perspective inheritance tax raised £3.5 billion last year, (but will raise less this year due to Labour's Conservative-copying panic-cuts last year);]which happens to be roughly the cost of the foreign committed crime (only on individuals and households remember) and the cost of our foreign prisoner population put together.
History of Immigration into Britain
One of the least credible and nonsensical arguments as to why we should put up with immigration is that according to the left, we’re an island of immigrants, always have been, always will be. Yep, any Americans reading – even we in Britain have to put up with historical-of-no-concern-to-the-present-day arguments from the left. And over here they are just as wrong.
I’d remind people that 2.7 million (4.6%) of the population of the UK has arrived since 1997. Compare to the historical trends (figures taken from this, but can be easily verified online):
•1066 - William the Conqueror invades with 10,000 Normans, more coming later. The Normans never exceed 5% of Britains then 1.5 million population.
•Next several centuries- periodic attacks against Jewish communities in Britain
•1685 onwards - 50,000 Protestant Huguenots seek asylum; population at the time is roughly 5million, so they represent an additional 1%
•Between 1880 and 1914, some 150,000 asylum seeking Jews (from persecution in Russia and Poland) settle in Britain, arriving at the rate of about 10,000 a year; British population is about 30million, so they represent 0.5%
•1935-1941 - 70,000 German and other Jews fleeing Hitler enter Britain; an additional 0.15%. Still, when war breaks out, many are held as being potentially "dangerous" to the war effort (including the previously quoted Claus Moser)
•1939-49 - 300,000 Eastern Europeans escaping the Nazis and the Russians settle here; population stands at 50 million so they represent around 0.6%
•1948 - Empire Windrush arrives with 492 West Indian immigrants, many ex-servicemen from the war with their families
•1955-1962 - 472,000 immigrants arrive from the Commonwealth, representing just 0.9% of our 53million population. However escalating racial tension and riots still cause government to impose stricter immigration controls
•1962-1980 - Commonwealth immigration continues at 70-75,000 pa
•1972- 30,000 Ugandan Asians fleeing the reign of Idi Amin recieve asylum in Britain; representing 0.05% of our population
•1980-1996 - Commonwealth immigration equates to 50,000 pa; net immigration close to zero
As you can see, bar when Britain was invaded in 1066, immigration hasn’t been as high as current levels at any period in our history – and this is what people reading this must get clearly – I’m not against immigration; simply the level and rate at which it is occurring.
Another (worrying) historical trend that one can see from above is that despite claims that immigration does not lead to racial tension, the majority of waves of immigration have been met with violence. Other than those mentioned above, the influx of Jews in the late 1800's surely presented an easy target for Mosley’s British Union of Fascists in the early 1900’s; and since WW2 we have had several -albeit localised- race related riots in the United Kingdom from the Notting Hill Carnival and Southall in 1976 and 1979 to Oldham and Bradford in 2001.
And let’s not forget the political cost of Labour’s immigration policies – the BNP with a seat on the London Assembly and over a 100 local councillors.
As Labour MP Frank Field commented:
Going back to the historical trends of immigration into Britain, rather than lending weight to the policy of New Labour, they show that a limited, low number immigration policy is exactly what this island has always had up to 1997; indeed using previously mentioned figures, in the quarter of a century previous to the curse of New Labour, net migration was minus 5,000.
Anyone still doubting the role of New Labour in this rapid increase in migration should consider this graph from the previously mentioned Lord’s report. Note the trend after 1997…
A Rational Policy
If I have not made it clear enough, I’m not against immigration into Britain; simply the level and the manner in which it is occurring under New Labour. My opinion, for those who wish to know, would be for a zero net effect cap (number of immigrants = number of emigrants) in line with a points-based system.
Earlier this year New Labour took a massive step in the right direction (it only took eleven years!) with the introduction of a point-system. However, this only applies to non-EU migrants and we still do not have an upper cap on numbers. What we have instead is a system that illogically discriminates against non-EU peoples and will fail to adress the scale of current migration, which is out of proportion to what we have we have witnessed in our nation's past; and fails to adress the obvious: high levels of migration regardless of the literacy or skills of the migrants is going to place a burden on our public services, increase the labour pool (supressing wages), and worsen the UK's balance of trade, as any unchecked population growth (regardless of source) would.
Gordon Brown has ruled out a cap on migrant numbers, ignoring the evidnece presented by the mentioned House of Lords committee. In the same link he has been quoted as saying:
"Most people who are proposing a cap are proposing a cap of only 20% of possible migrants into this country"
Thats interesting, because as I have raised earlier in the post, only 20% of all those immigrants who have entered the country since 1997 are working in skilled jobs!
It seems I am not alone - 76% of people favour an annual limit on immigration. (n.b. poll was carried out by YouGov, not the Conservatives before questions of reliability are raised)
Regardless of the pros and cons of New Labour's immigration policy it is their job as our elected representatives to represent our will - not to ignore the opinions of the majority of British citizens.
Reply With Quote
Originally Posted by Poach
. Lawsuits, new laws, fights, collisions and clashes. The riots in France over the last few years are nothing compared to what is coming up in Europe, from my perspective. There will be blood on the streets and innocents will be killed.
