This country and the western world will ignore mass migration at its peril. It will not do to tell people that immigration is good for them when all too often they feel that it’s not.
In the UK people are small c conservative. They are not far right, they are not extremist, they just mostly don’t like change. The Prime Minister accuses them of being NIMBYs, and to some degree that is true, but not because they don’t want anyone else to have what they have they just don’t want their lives to change too much.
The thousands of illegal migrants that arrive in Dover in small boats, which has increased dramatically since Labour won the election in July this year, is merely the tip of the iceberg. What people see, but very often confuse with those arriving here in dinghies, is legal immigration. Immigration which has been encouraged for years and years because successive governments will not deal with the productivity issues in this country.
Too many people are allowed to languish on benefits that perhaps they once needed, but all too frequently no longer do. It was lazy to bring people in to fill the gaps rather than do the difficult job of matching people to the vacancies that exist in the economy.
Illegal migrants arriving in Dover is just the tip of the iceberg.
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Millions of immigrants have come into our country in the last 25 years. They have fundamentally changed many things, some for the better, some not. The indigenous British people, and those who are second or third generation immigrants, feel they are now being overlooked in favour of these new migrant communities.
The former Conservative Government said it would deter people arriving here illegally with their Rwanda scheme. I fully believe that scheme would have worked. The Italian Prime Minister, Giorgia Meloni, believes offshoring the processing of illegal immigrants and asylum seekers will work, which is why she has agreed a deal with Albania. If you know you’re not going to be allowed to stay in the country you are attempting to enter, you are less likely to make the perilous and very expensive journey.
When Labour was elected to government, it abandoned Rwanda and the millions of pounds that were invested in it. Of course they blame the Conservatives, but that money wouldn’t have been wasted if the Conservatives had still been in government and Rwanda had become a viable system.
Migrant small boats continue to arrive from across the channel.
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Instead, they said they would smash the gangs. There has never been any intention to smash the gangs, and it would appear there’s no intention to do so now. Sir Keir Starmer relaunched his failing government yesterday, just five months after taking power. Immigration was not even mentioned. This is the type of arrogant politician who is storing up trouble which will eventually have to be dealt with. Their inability to look at themselves, to analyse what they do and what the results of their policies are, is in no small part why we’re in this mess now.
Labour’s claim that they are going to smash the gangs is as hollow now as it was for the last government. If we wanted to smash the gangs we could do so, today. Isn’t it interesting that the BBC, in their Radio Four programme entitled, To Catch a Scorpion, can find the people traffickers and immigrant smugglers, but apparently the British state cannot? It is inconceivable that we don’t know who they are and where they are. It is nonsensical to believe that we don’t have evidence which we could use with our international partners and Interpol to bring these people to justice.
There is no appetite and no intention to do anything of the sort. Sir Keir Starmer and the Labour Government are as dishonest as the governments that went before them when it comes to immigration. The problem is people in the UK, and indeed around the world, are starting to see through them and their lies. The British public will not put up with this for very much longer. The consequences are entirely predictable, but of course it won’t be any politician’s fault, will it?