Skipper

Following my last post on being forced to reconsider hallowed leftwing assumptions on welfare, Jackie Ashley's piece on immigration today does something similar for this fraught policy area. My position, like many others I suspect, has tended to be determined by the views of those I regard as political opponents: Conservatives, National Front, BNP and so forth. As long as they poured out hate and called for things like repatriation, I knew where I stood, or at least, thought I did.

A few years back Peter Mandelson suggested Labour take a closer look at immigration; I rather thought he was arguing for more skilful finessing of existing policy. The person who really got me thinking was Frank Field, someone whom I've always respected as transparently honest; he argued immigration policy was 'unsustainable'. Ashley's article completes the process, for me, whereby the case for re-examination is convincingly made. Government estimates of migration from Eastern Europe was 26,000 in advance of the accession of 10 new states in 2004; the actual current figure given by the government is 400,000 and that does not include illegals. Britain is so popular with aspirant immigrants because our welfare rules provide support and our employment rules provide good access to work, even if most of it is low paid.

Ashley points out that an influx of young people, hungry for work, must be good news for an ageing society constantly losing emigrants to sunnier climes. Many anecdotal reports confirm East Europeans are often more available, more efficient and cheaper than our elusive indigenous craftsmen. Good news for the consumer and for service companies seeking cheap labour to do the work our workers no longer wish to do. Not too much to worry about, you might think but this would be far too complacent. Firstly such a huge influx, as Field warns, places a huge burden on welfare services while those immigrants who are black economy workers contribute little or nothing to the common weal. Secondly it tends to crowd out local people from things like housing lists. Not so much middle class people with no need of such services, but poorer people already living in rundown areas which tend to host the new arrivals.

Thirdly, a huge addition to the labour market, at its cheapest end, inexorably pushes down wages still further. For many British people immigrants from Eastern Europe are a bit like those holiday home buyers in rural areas who make things bad for locals who want to buy their own homes. Ashley suggests the topic should be aired at the Manchester conference before arrivals begin from Bulgaria and Romania, warning that 'unless the government starts a debate on this issue, other, darker forces will.'