Our Scary Shambolic Migration "Debate"

SATURDAY, MAY 01, 2010

Our Scary Shambolic Migration "Debate"

On the campaign trail yesterday, Tyler had the chance to chat with leaders of our sizeable local muslim community. Very interesting.

For one thing, these are people who most definitely contribute to our society. Not only do they run a wide range of local businesses, they also really do believe in giving something back - both in time and money.

What also became clear was that they are as concerned about the immigration issue as the rest of us. They are as appalled as Tyler at Brown's dismissal of the Rochdale granny as a bigot. And they want to see somebody get a grip on the numbers now coming to Britain. Housing's a big local problem, jobs have become a problem, and this is all getting very scary.

One of the underlying problems of course, is that we haven't got a clear agreed view on what's actually going on.

For example, last night on BBC TV News, Prog Con spokesman Mark Easton did a "reality check" on Clegg's now notorious claim that 80% of immigrants come from within the EU (see yesterday's blog). And Easton concluded that Clegg is indeed wrong (see his blog here).

However - and it is A Big However - where Clegg is right is in saying that only a small proportion of total non-EU immigrants say they are coming here to work. In fact, in the most recent year (2008), the International Passenger Survey records only one-in-eight long-term migrants coming to the UK from outside the EU and saying they're coming to work.

Which is why, suggests Easton, Clegg is right in saying the evil Tories' plan to cap the number of non-EU workers coming in won't work.

Hmmm.

What Easton didn't explain is what are all the others coming here for?

Because in terms of overall net migration flows, that very same Survey tells us that migrants from outside the EU constituted 130% of total immigration. Overall net immigration was 129,000, of which no fewer than 168,000 came from outside the EU (the overall figure is only brought down to 129,000 because a net 84,000 Brits upped sticks and left).

The truth is that by far the biggest inward migration flow from outside the EU comes from people who say they are coming here to study.

If we look at the same Survey, we find that just in the last 5 years, over 0.5m people net came here from outside the EU saying they were going to study. Which is 60% of all net inward migration over the period.

And in principle, we should be delighted that people want to study here. Not only does it earn us money, but it also gives us valuable worldwide connections for the future.

The problem comes when these students don't actually leave again afterwards. Or even worse, when they are coming here as part of a thinly disguised people trafficking scam to study for one of those infamous bogus degrees.

So what should we do?

Despite what Easton implies, you have to believe that any capping system worth its salt will have to include students who want to stay on to work after they qualify. They can't just be left to join our labour force willy-nilly.

So a properly designed and enforced capping system must include such students from outside the EU.

The Tories are planning to do that... right?

FRIDAY, APRIL 30, 2010

Britain's Got Yellow Porkies

Long John Silver tribute act

Yes, I know - all politicos are economical with the actualité. But what this election is underlining is that the Lib Dems are in a league of their own.

Last night Clegg came out with a string of jaw-dropping porkies.

First, challenged by Cam over the LDs' amnesty for illegal immigrants, he said:

"I don't want you to be misled by David Cameron. I'm not advocating an amnesty."

No? In that case why does the LD manifesto say:

"We will allow people who have been in Britain without the correct papers for ten years, but speak English, have a clean record and want to live here long-term to earn their citizenship."

Because you see, Mr Clegg, that's an amnesty - an amnesty for people who are in Britain illegally.

It got worse, when Clegg tried to hit back at Cam. He said:

"David Cameron says you can put a cap on immigration. It is complete nonsense, since he knows that 80% of people who come into this country come from the European Union. You can't cap those numbers, so you shouldn't pretend to people, give them false hope that you can bring numbers down when you can't control them in that way. It's wrong to raise false hopes on such a sensitive topic."

80% from Europe? Really?

But how on earth does that square with the official numbers from the Office for National Statistics that we blogged just yesterday? Because those numbers tell us that the proportion is just 25% over the last decade, 50% over the last 5 years, and 40% over the last year for which the ONS has full data (2008). The very latest stats from the International Passenger Survey say it fell to just 34% over the most recent year (to mid-2009). All wayshort of the 80% waved around by Clegg.

Indeed, so egregious was this particular porkie that St Vince had to go on R4 Today this morning to explain it. Except that he couldn't. Instead, he came up with some shifty blather about Clegg using a different unofficial definition of immigration, and taking the 80% number from some article he read in a magazine. Shocking stuff from a Saint of the Realm (and listen to Tim Harford demolishing the LD stats here).

And then of course, there's the Euro. Lifelong europhile Clegg told us:

"No, I'm not advocating entry into the Euro, I'd only advocate it, by the way, if ever, if the economic conditions were right, if it was good for your jobs, good for pensions, good for savings."

Except of course, if the Lib Dems had been in power in 1999, we'd already be members of the Euro, stuck on the kebab skewer right alongside the PIGs. In their 1997 manifesto they promised they'd:

"Participate in a successful single currency. Being part of a successful single currency will bring low inflation and low interest rates. Staying out will result in less investment and a loss of influence."

No mention of that last night.

As Tyler has been discovering in the local campaign, the LDs may look clean, but they fight real dirty. They major on gross distortions of what their opponents say and do, and make contradictory policy promises to different groups of voters.

For years they've managed to get away with it, but only because they've never seriously been in contention at the national level.

Now they are in contention, we are getting a good look at just how shifty they are.

Can you just imagine how they'd cope with government? With their half-baked policies built on their distorted half-truths, we'd be calling in the IMF within weeks.

It simply doesn't bear thinking about.

THURSDAY, APRIL 29, 2010

Beneath Contempt

We need to keep this as a reminder of what they really think

It's amazing listening to those metro-media prog con pundits seeking to excuse Brown's abominable behaviour in Rochdale. Apparently, we all get angry about things, he's under a lot of stress, and he was just having a bad day.

But that's not at all what the rest of us heard. What we heard was a two-faced bully who holds even his own supporters in contempt. Contempt for the perfectly reasonable concerns of a perfectly reasonable woman facing up to the real problems millions like her encounter in their day-to-day lives.

And whether Brown likes it or not, they are concerned about immigration. He may not want to discuss it, but out here, it's A Very Big Issue.

We've blogged this many times, so we won't do so again here. But there is one point worth reiterating.

Quite a bit of the commentary we've heard over the last 24 hours has focused on the point that we can't do much about immigration, because of our EU membership. But that is nonsense.

The truth is that from 1997 to 2008 (the most recent year for which we havecomprehensive ONS stats), net migration into the UK totalled 2 million. Of that, just 0.5m came from the EU - including the new members like Poland.

Moreover, during that same period, a net 0.8m UK citizens left. Which means that net migration from countries outside the EU totalled an extraordinary 2.2 million:

And that is all migration we could stop.

Yes, of course we would want to make exceptions for genuine asylum seekers. And we might want also to make exceptions for some high skill workers (although we could just give them fixed-term work permits).

But that is nothing to do with our EU obligations.

In truth, the EU point is a cop out. It's yet another convenient argument for closing down discussion on immigration. Metropolitan prog cons don't want to discuss it, and they hold those that do in contempt.