Why evade the truth about immigration?

[conspiracy analyst]

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/opinion/main.jhtml?xml=/opinion/2007/10/21/ dl2101.xml

Why evade the truth about immigration?

Last Updated: 12:01am BST 21/10/2007



Immigration has brought many benefits to Britain, from the scientific and artistic genius of individuals who have come here, to the vibrancy that the rainbow of different cultures has brought to cities such as London. But unlimited immigration also has its costs.

If immigration into Britain continues at the present rate of around 200,000 people every year, there will be an additional 15 million inhabitants squeezed into these islands by 2051.

That is the estimate calculated by David Coleman, Professor of Demography at Oxford University, whose conclusions we report today. The Office of National Statistics has studiously avoided calculating a realistic estimate of the increase in Britain's population.
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Even the Government Actuary's Department, responsible for forecasts of Britain's population growth, seems to be in denial about the size of the likely increase.

But then denial, if not outright deception, has characterised almost all of the Government's pronouncements on immigration. Last week, its economists produced a report on the economic effects of immigration in which it was claimed that immigrants had added "3.1 per cent to Britain's Gross Domestic Product (GDP)" since 1998.

So they did — but the report omitted the other critical fact: over the same period, immigrants added 3.8 per cent to the total British population. Put those two together and you get the result that the effect of immigration since 1998 has been to lower GDP per capita, not to increase it.

The Government report failed to draw that conclusion, because its economists never put the two figures together. It is typical of the kind of misleading statement that usually characterises official pronouncements.

Take the oft-repeated claim that "immigrants have an enormously beneficial effect on the economy". It does not stand up to scrutiny — but it is hardly ever scrutinised. Ministers and Government "experts" simply assert that immigrants contribute in taxes far more than they take out in tax-funded services.

It is true that highly-paid immigrants pay much more in taxes than they consume in Government services. But most immigrants are not highly paid.

Of the 623,575 national insurance certificates awarded to Eastern European migrants between May 2004 and March 2007, for example, 77 per cent were for jobs which paid between £4.50 and £5.50 per hour. People on so low a level of pay receive back more in terms of tax-credits and other Government benefits than they pay in taxes.

Robert Rowthorn, Professor of Economics at Cambridge University, has surveyed the existing research. He found that the fiscal impact of large-scale immigration, whether positive or negative, is almost always tiny.

Immigrants, as a group, have not been, and are probably not going to be, a fiscal burden on the rest of society — but neither are they going to provide a significant surplus for the rest of us.

It is also worth remembering that the economic costs and benefits of immigration are not evenly distributed. To those who are competing with immigrants for jobs — existing residents who have low levels of skill and education — the effect of immigration is perceived as largely negative, essentially because it mostly is.

For those who can afford to employ nannies or cleaners or builders, the impact of immigration is largely beneficial: it increases the pool of available workers and keeps their wages down.

Government discussions of the economic impact of immigration never acknowledge that fact. It has the effect of distorting the whole debate, which has been founded on misleading statistics and an evasion of the truth.

There are many reasons for being in favour of immigration, but the Government should stop pretending that a beneficial effect on the nation's prosperity is one of them. If immigration is indeed going to increase Britain's population by 15 million over the next 50 years, it will have a colossal impact on the environment, on services and on the infrastructure.

We need an honest debate about what that will mean for Britain. Continuing to evade, deny and deceive only ensures the outcome the Government is rightly so eager to avoid: the intensification of opposition to immigration, and the magnification of the social problems that it can cause.

Comments

There will never be an honest debate about this. There was once an honest politician who tried about forty years ago. The country has been betrayed by the wealthy and the politicians who will eventually take themselves and family off to an unspoilt area abroad leaving everyone else to live in a festering multicultural hell.
Posted by Robin Curtis on October 21, 2007 1:58 PM
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Whilst calling for an honest and open debate you also have evaded the question of the social consequences, which are potentially more catastrophic than the economic ones.
Posted by Vandiemen on October 21, 2007 1:15 PM
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We don't need endless debates (prevarification), only positive action will suffice.
Posted by Conkeyron on October 21, 2007 12:09 PM
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"vibrancy" ..... "rainbow of different cultures"

Oh please!
Posted by Iain on October 21, 2007 11:44 AM
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The proponents of immigration would gladly debate, and keep that debate running decades. When debase is used as a delaying tactic, the wise thing, is not to win it, but avoid it. It is time to send the foreigners back home. There is nothing to discuss.
Posted by Mark Anthony Taylor on October 21, 2007 10:02 AM
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Why evade the truth about immigration? Here are
some scenarios that may answer that question:
1. It is 'racist' to question immigration.
2. It suits many in business to employ cheap
labour/keep our own labour costs down.
3. It is part of new labour's social 're-
engineering' strategy.
4. It suits the purposes of 'great European
project'.
Al in all a pretty unholy alliance!
Posted by Anthony on October 21, 2007 9:53 AM
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Evading the truth about immigration, and the EU, has been a crass act of treason inflicted against the people of this country. It has been systematically perpetrated by the pusillanimous politicians of all parties for the past fifty years. Until some patriotic leader like William Cobbett arises, who has the courage to confront the politicians and say to them: "May that man perish for ever and ever, who, having the power, neglects to bring to justice the perjured, the suborning, the insolent miscreants, who openly sell their country's rights and their own souls", there is little hope for us. Enoch Powell was such a man, but he was betrayed by the internationalists who have infected the body politic like a pestilential disease.

Posted by Ronald G W Rickcord on October 21, 2007 9:43 AM
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We should call it what is and that is genocide, and the guilty who have brought us to this pretty pass should be brought to account:

"UN Declaration of Indigenous Rights of Indigenous Peoples

As adopted by the General Assembly on 13th September 2007.

The Declaration establishes a universal framework of minimum standards for the survival, dignity, well-being and rights of the world's indigenous peoples. The Declaration addresses both individual and collective rights; cultural rights and identity; rights to education, health, employment, language, and others. It outlaws discrimination against indigenous peoples and promotes their full and effective participation in all matters that concern them. It also ensures their right to remain distinct and to pursue their own priorities in economic, social and cultural development.

Includes :

Article 7.2 "Indigenous peoples have the collective right to live in freedom, peace and security as distinct peoples"

Article 8.1 "Indigenous peoples and individuals have the right not to be subjected to forced assimilation or destruction of their culture."

Article 8.2 "States shall provide effective mechanisms for prevention of, and redress for:
(a) Any action which has the aim or effect of depriving them of their integrity as distinct peoples, or of their cultural values or ethnic identities;
(b) Any action which has the aim or effect of dispossessing them of their lands, territories or resources;
(d) Any form of forced assimilation or integration;




Posted by Roger Clark on October 21, 2007 9:39 AM
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The current state of the UK under New Labour has
served to devalue the sacrifices made by our people
in both world wars.
Posted by tobias on October 21, 2007 9:23 AM
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Political correctness will ensure there is no meaningful debate as to the wisdom of mass immigration into Britain.

What amazes me is, how does this government know the beneficial rewards to the nation when they haven't a clue as to how many immigrants are here in the first place.

This whole immigration business simply does not add up (no pun intended).
Posted by Graham on October 21, 2007 9:07 AM
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I, like many others, am busy making plans to quietly leave this country. It doesn't take a rocket scientist to see that this policy of unabated bombardment will soon ruin the very country our forefathers fought so hard to protect. Rather than requiring a military invasion, these people are simply walking in, joining millions of others at the teat of the UK, sucking with impunity. As well as helping towards their upkeep as a taxpayer.
Posted by K.Dwyer on October 21, 2007 8:55 AM
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"Is nobody brave enough to speak out about its obvious consequences?
Posted by Herbert Thornton on October 21, 2007 1:31 AM"

Apart from the BNP, absolutely not. This is a real hell-hole in the making unless some grip is exerted, and that very soon.

Posted by Roger Clark on October 21, 2007 8:54 AM
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What about those highly skilled IT workers that have been displaced by migrant workers? When I returned to the UK in 2003 I found that much of the industry was suffering with an obsession of disposing of British workers in favour of cheaper alternatives on work permits. All of these permits were fraudulent as there are more than enough skilled people in the country. I didn’t have the financial reserves or the resources of a family to survive and went bankrupt, got made homeless and suffered from physical and mental illness that continues to this day and probably for the rest of my shortened life.

Immigrants a benefit to the country, I don’t think so. The only people who are benefitting are the Labour party.
Posted by David Bodden on October 21, 2007 8:50 AM
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Irrespective of whether or not those flooding into the UK are from the EU or other parts of the world the issue is now fairly simple, if the UK was a landlord it would probably be classified as a slumlord for allowing gross overcrowding in appalingly delapidated accomodation and not providing, no doubt in contravention of the Health and Safety Act, a safe environment for its residents thus causing a breakdown in social order. Whilst many of the immigrants may have come from such, or even worse, living conditions that is no excuse to allow UK standards to suffer. There are no economic benefits to the UK or British people of a mass influx of individuals that in most cases are reluctant to integrate into a society that they want to benefit from and have no immediate potential to add value to this country being allowed to settle here at this time. An emergency should be declared in order to implement a strictly enforced, exclusively targetted, immigration regime. This would also apply to EU citizens (maybe by means of A "Red Line") and efforts made over time to slow down the exodus of indigineous British from their homeland
Posted by James in Canterbury Kent on October 21, 2007 8:43 AM
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Another unintended consequence will be the end of historical Britain and it's people.
Posted by Ward on October 21, 2007 8:36 AM
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England will become 'Englandistan' by virtue of their (islamic) higher birth rate.

Posted by r bradley on October 21, 2007 8:34 AM
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When conditions and opportunities here cease to be more attractive than in the immigrants' countries of origin, immigration will naturally slow and eventually stop altogether. Many, I am sure, will start returning to their countries of origin, as these become "relatively" less unattractive.

Politicians, business leaders, investors, and others, want population and economic growth because they can exploit them politically and economically (on the political left, they also exploit it ideologically, claiming for themselves the "moral high ground"). This is what human "Prime Apes" naturally do, in their continuing, but fatefully misplaced, Darwinian struggle for survival in the artificial socio-economic environment they have created for themselves.

"Homo sapiens", indeed! "Homo stupidus economicus" is more like it!
Posted by Roger Hicks on October 21, 2007 7:12 AM
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"We need an honest debate........." Do me a favour. Fine words, always leading to waffle and no action. The immigration issue is in Liebour's too difficult box along with many other issues like environment/global warming, road pricing, nuclear power, European Treaty etc which need to be "debated" too. All Liebour politicians' public utterances always start with those famous words "we need an honest debate...." then descend into obfuscation and no real discussion. The words rank with "we have to stike a balance....." as those most popularly used by Liebour when trying to deal with issues critical to the well being of Great Britain. Rest assured, nothing will be done and all meaningful "debate" will be stifled until Liebour are turfed from office.
Posted by Roger Sutton on October 21, 2007 6:48 AM
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You fail to mention that one reason for Labour's
enthusiasm for mass immigration is that by and
large, they are the main beneficiary of
immigrants' votes, and thereby secure for
themselves an unllimited future period in office.

Another overlooked factor is the rapid rate at
which native Brits are removing themselves from
a country in which they no longer feel at ease or
"at home", which will surely accelerate the pace
of its changing composition.

Moreover, you appear to avoid the social
cohesion aspect, tentatively alluded to by
Damian Green. So long as everyone tiptoes
around afraid of saying the now unsayable, there
will NEVER be an "honest debate"; all sides will
continue to "evade, deny and deceive" because
that is what Britain has now reduced itself to.

Few in public life have the guts to express what
the indigenous population (whose views don't
seem to matter much any more) really think.
And furthermore, what is the point of such a
debate being held simply between politicians,
who rarely experience the consequences of this
immigration themselves?



Posted by alex on October 21, 2007 4:18 AM
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I spent my childhood in Britain during the 1940s and '50s. I have returned at intervals: each time the impact of increasing population is my first unpleasant impression of reality in England. Bumper-to-bumper traffic, depressing mass housing developments and interminable waiting lists for services soon complete the picture.
The very idea that this obscenely overcrowded speck of earth has been encouraging immigration at any level - let alone on the scale of the past decade - should have rung alarm bells in the minds of intelligent people.
Perhaps the heady vapours of Climate Change have made people forget that the old problems of human toxic waste and encroachment on wildernesses and places of beauty are still alive and lethal. And with far more immediate and tangible consequences.
Unfortunately, the stresses of simply surviving in the world's largest bus station seem to have anaesthetised the national consciousness and created a society without any real regard for its own future welfare.
Posted by Richard Laurence on October 21, 2007 3:44 AM
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The major problem is that the government is unable to regulate, in the same way that say Australia and other countries do, what qualifications immigrants will have, since it is part and parcel of the free movement of people within the European Union.

Such a system can lead only to a reduction in benefits for all, since minimum-wage earnings will be inadequate to fund the status quo.

More depressing is the fact that the government has no idea how many people are in the country in the first place, which would seem to make planning for any demographic shift impossible.
Posted by supertrunker on October 21, 2007 2:47 AM
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What are the projections for the different ethnic groups, and what will the ethnic makeup be of the UK 50 years hence?

I suspect this will be even more concerning than the headline number.

To ask this question is not racist. To deny or hide the results is racist.
Posted by Mike on October 21, 2007 2:39 AM
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The article is headed "Why evade the truth about immigration?" - but by carefully avoiding any mention of Islamic immigration, it does exactly that.

Is nobody brave enough to speak out about its obvious consequences?
Posted by Herbert Thornton on October 21, 2007 1:31 AM

[conspiracy analyst]

Billionaire plea for cheap labour
October 21, 2007 12:00am

BILLIONAIRE retailer Gerry Harvey says Australia needs a two-tier wage
system to allow employers to pay foreign guest workers less than
locals.
The Harvey Norman boss said Australia's prosperity was creating a
labour shortage and endangering the nation's competitiveness.
He said a growing number of Australian manufacturers were moving
overseas, where cheap labour was plentiful.
He called on the Federal Government to allow foreign workers on fixed
visas to form a second tier to the labour market.
"Australia doesn't have cheap labour. Many overseas workers would be
prepared to move here for a much better life and half the money
Australians earn," he said.
"When you get unemployment down to four per cent, to three per cent,
to two per cent, business can't get the labour.
"I've got horse studs and it's difficult to get staff.
"Workers would rather work in the mines where they get paid twice as
much.
"Fruit- picking companies are relying on backpackers."
Mr Harvey said both major parties needed to open the gates to
migrants.
"The US can draw on a lot of cheap labour from Mexico and South
America," he said.
"People from those countries move to the US looking for a better
life.
"European countries can draw on cheap labour from eastern Europe.
"The danger of being too prosperous is that it can come back to bite
you - you can become too lazy and other nations work harder and
overtake you."
"What I'm saying is not politically correct.
"You won't get politicians saying what I'm saying, but privately they
know this sort of thing is a reality in the future."

[TonyGosling]

It is not in any way racist to demand that we have full employment in Britain. That will only happen if we stop encouraging foreigners in to force down our pay and conditions here in the UK and to turn our benefits system on to critical.
Brits like me want jobs - but we will not get jobs when pitted against migrant workers. That's the whole idea to turn our economy critical and sink the nation driving us into the hands of the internationalists
.
You are lazy - the mantra being touted around by the right - both domestic and foreign - is exactly what the ruling class said to justify stealing our land centuries ago in the theft of enclosure.
The only reason we now have the vote is bacause they have all the power through land and money and media so our vote is virtuclly worthless.
Just look at Greece.
It was a different story in the 1960s when there was full employment. Every reason to bring in migrant workers.
But mass immigration as we are going under and forced by the EU is how this country is being brought to its knees

Why no British staff at Pret A Manger?
http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/72abb40a-8a38-11e1-a0c8-00144feab49a.html
By Richard Lambert - April 19, 2012 7:51 pm FT
My unsettling statistic of the week: the number of UK nationals in employment in the three months to December fell by 166,000 compared with the previous year, to 26.6m. Over the same period, the number of non-UK nationals in work rose to 2.6m, an increase of – exactly 166,000. The question posed is this: when there is so much slack in the labour market, with unemployment running at nearly 2.7m, how is it possible that so many companies still find it makes sense to take on foreign migrants?
Part of the answer is to be found in the sectors where jobs are being created. When did you last buy a sandwich from a Briton at Pret A Manger, or check into a hotel where the majority of receptionists did not come from overseas? Restaurants, hotels and consumer-facing businesses of all kinds seem to have decided in recent years that young Britons are just not as good as others when it comes to friendly and reliable service, a serious work ethic – or simply turning up on time and on a regular basis.
They may well be right. Chris Grayling, the employment minister, suggested tentatively this week that hiring people from eastern Europe with a few years’ experience might have become the easy way out for companies. Perhaps we should look to give young people closer to home a chance, he said – “turning round the lives of somebody from a poor background, given no real opportunity in life – and end up with a model employee as a result”.
But if companies already have a ready supply from abroad of the motivated talent they require, why should they take on the risky and expensive job of hiring relatively unskilled people who too often seem to have an attitude problem? Anecdotes of failure are more common among employers in this respect than are stories about the star recruit who turned up from around the corner.
Yet what seems to make sense for an individual company may not make sense for business as a whole. The number of households in the UK where no one has ever worked has doubled since 1998 to about 300,000, excluding the 70,000 or so that are occupied by students. Set this alongside other grim UK data, such as the very high proportion of young British men who are not in education, employment or training, and you see a pattern that has serious consequences both for household spending and consumption and for the public sector finances stretching way into the future. A growing underclass has damaging economic implications and represents a potential threat to social cohesion. It cannot simply be ignored.
Of course, the long-term response must lie in policies that create the education and skills required for success at work. In the short term, welfare and benefit systems that provide the right incentives for work are a necessity, and the government is attempting to address these priorities. But the challenge is not just for politicians and schools. If companies are unhappy with the attitude of young British employees, it is up to them to do something about it – as an increasing number now are – by engaging with schools at all levels, offering decent workplace experience and providing the training needed to turn raw recruits into valuable employees.
One example: an analysis this week by the Education and Employers Taskforce emphasised the value of high-quality work experience, but suggested more could be achieved if programmes were better organised. Roughly half of all placements are found by the schoolchildren or their families using largely existing social networks, thus placing barriers in the path of workless families. Perhaps companies could do more to pull in young people on placements.
British business rightly places a high value on our flexible labour market. But if it fails to address this problem of collective action – and continues to rely too heavily on the easy way out in its recruitment efforts – then that flexibility will be put at risk. Governments cannot afford to sit back and watch the development of a cohort of unskilled unemployed youth with little economic stake in society.
Mr Grayling was extremely circumspect this week. It’s not impossible to imagine a future minister taking a more aggressive stance, and imposing on business the kind of compulsory training regime that would stifle enterprise and hold back growth. The jobs data need to be seen as a call to action.
The writer is former director-general of the CBI and a previous FT editor

Huddersfield MP Barry Sheerman demands British jobs for British workers after disappointing bacon buttie
by Barry Gibson, Huddersfield Daily Examiner - Apr 25 2012
BRITISH people should be “first in line” for jobs, according to Huddersfield’s MP.
Barry Sheerman made the demand yesterday after a foreign coffee shop worker got his order wrong before handing him “the worst bacon bap”.
The Labour man yesterday called on British firms to give young people in Huddersfield “first crack” at jobs over recently arrived immigrants from Eastern Europe.
And the veteran backbencher warned that “pernicious political correctness” could prevent a proper debate of the issue.
On Monday Mr Sheerman used micro-blogging website Twitter to vent his frustration at poor service in a coffee shop.
He wrote: “Just had worst coffee & bacon bap in London at Victoria Station. Why can’t Camden Food Co employ English staff?”
http://www.examiner.co.uk/news/local-west-yorkshire-news/2012/04/25/hu ddersfield-mp-barry-sheerman-demands-british-jobs-for-british-workers- after-disappointing-bacon-buttie-86081-30832588/

[TonyGosling]

Morland Sanders investigates the reality of employment in post-recession Britain: ultra-flexible, insecure and part-time work, and self-employment

http://www.channel4.com/programmes/dispatches/on-demand/60547-001