In 1971 Dick Cavett hosted Enoch Powell and Jonathan Miller on his show, the conversation soon found its way to immigration. Enoch’s position was pretty clear, that immigration was too high and that he could see problems arising from a significant change in the racial demographic of the country, Miller on the other hand took a different approach, his view was that multiculturalism was indeed difficult and required delicate political management and that Enoch Powell would use his time better if he proffered solutions on how to manage these changes instead of fanning the flames of bigotry.
These conversations are still with us today and maybe even more so than in 1971. I genuinely believe that politicians across the board missed a huge opportunity to make immigration work for everyone and that there was a great deal of wisdom in Jonathan Miller’s words.
In 1971, migrants and those who were second/third generation immigrants was around 4% of the UK population, today this figure stands at around 20%, this is a huge shift and when not managed properly could lead to serious issues, the question therefore is why has immigration to the UK grown 5 fold in 50 years?
Drivers of immigration
Immigration is a function of foreign and economic policy and looking at immigration through these lenses gives us a clearer view of the situation.
In 2001 the UK and the US led the invasion of Iraq on the claim that there were weapons of mass destruction in the country, this turned out to be bogus. The damage to the country on the other hand was real and devastating, with consequences still felt today.
Prior to 2001 most British citizens had never met an Iraqi, Afghan, Syrian or any of the other asylum seekers that have come to the UK over the last 25 years. Most migrants (read asylum seekers) who have crossed the English channel over the last 5 years have come from these three countries mentioned, those that have come from Africa have come through Libya (another casualty of the UK’s foreign policy.
In 2023 net migration to the UK was almost 1 million people, with half of those coming under programs set up for Ukrainians and citizens of Hong Kong, this migration was influenced by the UK’s foreign policy towards the Russia/Ukraine war and China’s administration of Hong Kong.
The numbers don’t lie, the vast majority of asylum and refugee migration to the UK has been influenced by its foreign policy.
I arrived in the UK in 1994 from Nigeria
In 1997 I voted for the second time in my life in the UK general election (a right afforded to me as a citizen of a commonwealth country, the first time was in the June 1993 election in Nigeria).
I vote went to the labour party led by Tony Blair
Migrant Enclaves
In 1994 I arrived in the UK
Everytime I hear the words “immigration is too high, it needs to come down” I simply ask why? Why does immigration need to come down? The reason most people give is that the country is unable to cope. That resources are limited and that schools are oversubscribed, that housing is in short supply and that the NHS is baulking at the seams. For me this only means that the government needs to spend on these services or in some cases spend more efficiently. Why? Because these things can exist even with zero immigration.
The recent outburst by Suella Braverman was right down this alley. She wants net immigration to come down to the tens of thousands. She hasn’t given a clear reason but I suspect that it is purely political, it is to convince those who think net immigration is too high that she is doing something about it. She went on to say that the UK has too much unskilled immigration. But is this true? And should net immigration come down?
No nation on earth is able to meet its labour demands, every nation requires immigration of some sort. Immigration is mostly an economic decision and generally should be driven by economic policy. It is also a moral decision in cases where people are fleeing and need refuge however this accounts for less. For developed nations they need both highly skilled immigration and unskilled immigration. Highly skilled immigration because of the following reasons:
Talent is limited
Lack of interest among those with the talent
High cost of training
They need unskilled immigration because as living wages improve then certain jobs become less appealing, this coupled with the social safety net of social security compounds the problem. There are certain jobs that are not worth the while of UK citizens because of the gap between those wages and the benefits they get.
The solution to some would be to either lower the benefits or hike the wages of certain jobs that remain unfilled by locals. But here is the dilemma that the UK faces, simply reducing the benefits would most likely lead to an increase in crime and poverty. Increasing the wages of certain jobs isn’t feasible. If a product like say Asparagus has a price ceiling then it most likely will have a wage ceiling. Breaking the wage ceiling would lead to breaking the price ceiling which inturn could lead to a necessity becoming a luxury.
The UK currently has 1.3 million unfilled vacancies, a good portion of these vacancies are for unskilled positions, this is according to the Office of National Statistics. If this is true (which it is), then how can we have too many unskilled immigrants in this country? It is either that these unskilled immigrants are here illegally and are unable to work and are feeding off the land (i.e. eating grass) or they are able to work but refusing to so end up on benefits. The First point can be refuted easily, I mean when was the last time you walked past a field and saw an immigrant family happily or unhappily feasting on green lush vegetation? probably never. So could it be that they are on benefits?
According to government data, white British citizens are most likely to be in receipt of non-income benefits when compared to ethnic minorities and non British whites and least likely to be in receipt of income based benefits when compared to ethnic minorities and non British whites. This means ethnic minorities and non British whites are more likely to work than White British citizens. This means migrants are not more workshy than white Brits.
Keep quiet, you don’t know what CRT is, you have never been able to explain it once in your life. You are an intellectual riff raff compared to Derrick Bell.
CRT is about the American judiciary and only taught to law students. Sham
e no one pushed back when you started this crap.