So many points to answer...
Alas, I have no good reply to shadbolt's assertion that runaway immigration is to blame for the bewilderingly large variety of coffees on sale in Richmond. All I can advise is that he asks for a grande skinny latte with extra mocachino. I have no idea what that means but as he is apparently served by people with little grasp of English, it surely can't do any harm.
The objections to immigration which people have expressed here seem to be either economic or cultural. The economic questions require more knowledge than I possess, so for now I'll just point out that the costs due to people emigrating from Britain and taking their wealth with them (as Carl Faulkner said) can hardly be considered as part of the costs of immigration. (Is he proposing to ban people from leaving the country?) And if you are going to allow people to emigrate from Britain, then it seems to me you can allow similar numbers to immigrate INTO phpbb_Britain without incurring extra infrastructure costs.
On the cultural side of things, Carl Faulkner said:
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Immigration is a problem. Ask people in the industrial north what has happened to their communities. Much is said about this community or that community but these new commmunities have displaced long established ones with a culture that is alien to these shores and as a result of continued mass immigration second and third generation children are being brought up in what could only be termed a semi-British environment.
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This seems to get to the heart of the issue: Why exactly is immigration a problem? So let's talk, as you say, about the north (or T'North, as I shall henceforth call it). I used to live in Manchester, near an area of the city called Rusholme. Presumably Rusholme was once a typical Lancashire village. Later, in the 19th century, it became a suburb of Manchester, similar to many other such suburbs. By the time I first saw it in the 1980s, mass immigration had meant that nearly every shop was Asian-owned and run. A vast number of Indian takeaways, Indian restaurants, shops selling brightly-coloured bolts of cloth for saris, signs in Urdu and Hindi - the character and culture of the area had obviously undergone a profound change. The English-owned shops which presumably existed there before had been entirely displaced. Had anything been lost? No, not in the slightest - you only had to walk about 1/2 mile to find parades of shops much like those which previously existed in Rusholme. Had anything been gained? Yes - south Manchester is more diverse and interesting as a result. English and Asian cultures exist alongside each other and interact in interesting, useful ways. (I still miss my curry-and-chips takeaways). Immigration didn't obliterate the local culture - it just displaced it a few hundred yards down the road.
In time, these immigrant communities will merge INTO phpbb_the wider culture and identity of the British, enriching it in the process, as has happened many times before with many previous waves of immigrants. It has made us what we are. Indigenous population my foot!