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Thursday, Jan 18, 2007
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The great immigration debate in Britain

Hasan Suroor

The British Government is making its immigration policy on the hoof. This can only be damaging to natives and immigrants alike.

THE IMMIGRATION debate in Britain, which was briefly overshadowed by the "Muslim question," is hotting up again fuelled by fears that the country is about to be "swamped" by an influx of immigrants from Bulgaria and Romania, the two former Communist states that joined the European Union on January 1. Until recently, Britain had an open-door policy for citizens of EU member countries. But in a knee-jerk response to lurid tabloid headlines and pressure from lobby groups the Government has clamped down on the number of Bulgarians and Romanians who can work and live in the United Kingdom effectively creating two classes of EU immigrants.

The limits imposed on Bulgarian and Romanian immigrants is supposed to be the Government's way of making up for the "blunder" it made in 2004 when — unlike, say, Germany and France — it allowed unrestricted entry to people from eight new EU members from Eastern Europe. Its estimate of the number of people who were likely to come turned out to be embarrassingly off the mark. In the past four years, some 600,000 workers have arrived against the Government's estimate of 15,000 a year.

The biggest influx has been from Poland. Thousands of young, educated, and hardworking Poles have moved into jobs native Britons were reluctant to do — and for wages that wouldn't even get you the time of the day from the unemployed neighbourhood Johnny. Because they are willing to work, are good at what they do — from plumbing and waiting on tables to servicing computers and driving buses — and come cheap there is widespread demand for them. They are sought after by the very people who then chuckle at tasteless anti-Polish jokes and demonise Polish workers. Famously, there was the case of a leader of the anti-immigrant United Kingdom Independence Party (UKIP) who was found using cheap East European workers to renovate his home even as his party was loudly campaigning against them.

Once, `Paki' was the catchall term of abuse for immigrants from the Indian sub-continent. Today, it is `Polish plumber' for EU immigrants from the former Communist bloc. They are the target of an unmistakably xenophobic campaign accusing them of taking away local jobs; driving down wages; causing demographic imbalance in areas where they are concentrated; putting intolerable strains on already creaking public services; and threatening the British way of life.

Migrationwatch UK, a right-wing group headed by a former civil servant, Andrew Green, has produced a study rejecting government claims that large-scale migration has boosted the British economy by £4 billion a year. According to its widely publicised findings, the benefit that immigrants bring is just around four pence a week per Briton or £2.10 a year. "The main beneficiaries are the migrants themselves who are able to send home about £10 million a day," it claims.

The Bank of England, which is independent of political control and does not represent the government view, has rebutted this pointing out that there is "little evidence" that immigrants are making it harder for native Britons to find jobs. It has also questioned claims that a 0.8 per cent rise in unemployment among local Britons over the previous 18 months is because their jobs are being taken away by new immigrants.

But in the prevailing climate of paranoia (according to opinion polls, 70 to 80 per cent of Britons regard immigration as a problem) people are more inclined to believe what confirms their own prejudices. Ask them who is telling the truth: racially motivated pressure groups, or the Bank of England and most are likely to plump for the former. The most disturbing aspect of the current debate is that it is no longer the usual suspects such as Sir Andrew and the Tories who want Britain to put up the `house full' board. There is a growing liberal consensus that Britain has become too crowded and cannot afford `unlimited' immigration. Labour MPs and left-wing `internationalist' commentators have also joined the chorus of `controlled' immigration — a euphemism for pulling up the drawbridge. More and more Labour and Tory politicians (the Liberal Democrats are quiet for now) are saying that their constituents have "genuine concerns" about the effect immigration is having on jobs, wages, housing, and community cohesion. "I'm not racist but please not in my backyard" is the growing refrain.

The slow but steady rise of the British National Party whose one-point agenda is to throw out immigrants shows how much the public mood has changed, and it is getting uglier by the day. Hysterical reports, predicting a wave of gangsters, sex traffickers and HIV-carriers, dominated the headlines in the weeks leading to Romania and Bulgaria's entry into the EU. And on January 1, Heathrow airport swarmed with photographers and camera crews ready to record the start of a `deluge' but all they found was a solitary man on a flight from Sofia; and a solitary woman on a flight from Bucharest. "The cameras were ready. Reporters were poised to intercept the vanguard of Britain's latest invasion from Eastern Europe. The only thing missing was the migrants," reported one newspaper. Journalists who had specially flown to Bulgaria and Romania to follow the trail of would-be immigrants returned disappointed. "Complete waste of time. No one wanted to fly. We even offered to help with the fare," The Independent quoted a tabloid photographer as saying.

The Government maintains that immigration is good for economy with Prime Minister Tony Blair routinely highlighting the contribution made by immigrants. But there is a huge gap between the Government's public rhetoric and what the Home Office actually practises. Britain's immigration regime is in a permanent flux as the government tries to change rules or make new ones in response to the prevailing political mood. The result is an immigration policy made on the hop without regard to its effect on people who are already in Britain.

Even as I write this, hundreds of immigrants — including many from India — suddenly find themselves unwanted as a result of an arbitrary change in rules under which they came to Britain. Four years ago, the British Government decided to open up immigration for highly skilled professionals and entrepreneurs to meet shortages in areas like IT, and to attract investment. It launched a Highly-Skilled Migrant Programme (HSMP) and those who qualified under it were offered full residency in Britain after they had stayed in the country for four years. Many gave up good jobs and sold their businesses in their own countries to make a life in Britain. But suddenly not only have the rules been changed but they are to be applied retrospectively. This means that those who do not fulfil the new income levels and qualifications required under the revised criteria must return home.

Many say they have no job or home to return to because they gave up everything to start a new life in Britain. The Government claims that the changes are meant to prevent abuse of the system and to make sure that only those who can benefit Britain are allowed to settle here. Fair enough. What is being questioned is the logic of applying the new rules retrospectively.

"We respect Britain's right to change its immigration laws, but bringing people under one set of rules and then changing them at short notice to get rid of them is arbitrary," said a spokesman for the Voice of Britain's Skilled Immigrants, a protest group.

This is a typical example of the gap between what the government preaches — immigration is good — and what it is actually doing. The point is not Britain's right to regulate immigration (if it wishes it could ban immigration altogether), and nor is it about a sensible and robust debate about the cost and benefit of immigration. The problem is a lack of a clear-cut policy. All too often the Blair Government gives the impression of trying to run with the hare and hunt with the hounds in its attempt to appease white working class voters who are increasingly turning to the BNP without losing its ethnic vote bank.

What Britain needs is a coherent and long-term policy made not on the back of BNP-inspired fear of losing white voters but grounded in whether the country needs more immigrants — and if yes, how many. If it believes that further immigration is not in national interest then it should not hesitate to clamp down but any policy must be well thought out and valid for at least the next five to ten years so that potential immigrants know what they are buying into. Meanwhile, politicians and the media could help lower the temperature by leaving the `ugly' foreigner alone for a bit.

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