Britannist

The huge influx of eastern european workers into the UK has been criticised by (among others) elected members of the Labour, Conservative and UK Independence Parties – as well as by MigrationWatch, the Centre for Policy Studies, the head of the publication ‘The Big Issue’ and the President of Poland.

What’s the negative effect of the massive influx of eastern european migrants into the UK (since eight eastern european nations entered the EU on 1.5.2004)? The answer is: crime up, rents up, house prices up, taxes up, council taxes up, unemployment for British people up (as eastern europeans take their jobs), homelessness up, black market work up, tax credit claims (by east europeans) up, overcrowded accommodation up, overcrowded trains up, overcrowded buses up, overcrowded motorways up, overcrowded doctors surgeries and hospitals up, attendance and day/night shelters (by east europeans) up, strains on public services/housing up – and British wages down, the amount of rented accommodation down, the availability of housing for sale reduced and eastern european countries losing their best workers (who are migrating to the UK) causing a shortage of health service professionals in those nations (resulting in longer hospital waiting lists).

The following are comments/quotes/reports (I have written down and kept a record of) about the negative effects of the influx of eastern european influx into the UK (from the 8 eastern european nations who entered the EU on 1.5.2004):

1. A lady from the Centre for Policy Studies (speaking on behalf the head of the Centre, Ruth Lea) said to presenter Jeremy Paxman on BBC 2 Television Newsnight in October 2006 that she had visited Norfolk and met local young people who had told her that they could not get jobs because unskilled work had been taken by eastern european workers. She said that eastern european workers might suit the wealthy who were looking for cheap labour, but the cost was that our own people were unemployed and, consequently, costing the taxpayer by claiming benefit. She called for training and re-training of British workers for the job market and questioned the need for the massive influx of workers from eastern europe.

Ruth Lea, Director of the Centre for Policy Studies, wrote in the Daily Telegraph edition of 28.8.2006 (brief extract) “Immigration is not the solution to our skills shortage. Over the last two years, a large number of eastern europeans have migrated here. But large-scale immigration cannot be the long-term solution to our skills problem. Education and retraining has to be.”

2. Sir Andrew Green, Chairman of the independent immigration monitoring service, said on 31.7.2006 “All is fine if you live in Islington. There you benefit from cheap restaurants and plenty of plumbers and nannies. For the rest of us, the impact on income per head is trivial. Robert Rowthorn, Professor of Politics at Cambridge, wrote recently that (quote) the Government’s claim about the economic benefits of immigration is false – all the research suggests that the benefits for the existing population as a whole are either close to zero, or negative (End of quote). We have reached a turning point. The public has finally seen through the Government’s falsehoods about ‘managed migration’ and its supposed benefits. People are deeply concerned that the numbers are out of control and are having a huge impact on our society.”

MigrationWatch, the independent immigration monitoring service, said in a new research paper it published on 29.8.2006 that only immigrants who can earn over £27, 000 a year should be allowed into the UK because those who are paid less than that do not make a “positive contribution” MigrationWatch said that the salary figure of £27, 000 was a good sum from which to work out an optimum (maximum) level of immigration as suggested in 2006 by the UK Home Secretary, John Reid. Statistics from the Labour Force Survey (organised by the Government) were used to find that someone has to earn £27, 000 a year to contribute positively over a lifetime to the economy through tax or towards British GDP. “Immigration is only beneficial to the UK if it raises productivity – otherwise it simply adds to pressure on public services and infrastructure” the MigrationWatch report claimed. It further suggested that the best rôle for migrants to the UK would be to temporary fill gaps in the job market while British workers received training and then return to their originating countries. The social costs of mass immigration were greater than any benefits, MigrationWatch said. Four out of five migrants to the UK do not go on to earn £27, 000 a year or above that level.

Sir Andrew Green, Chairman on the independent immigration monitoring service, MigrationWatch, said on 22.4.2006 “Most of these workers take low paid jobs and so they are holding down wages down at the bottom end of the labour market. This makes it more difficult to achieve the Government’s aims of moving one million people from welfare to work.” Mr. Green also said that the arrival of east europeans in the UK was causing house prices for first time buyers to increase.”

* MigrationWatch said on 20.6.2006 that 70% of the housing shortage in the UK is due to immigration.

3. The Local Government Association (LGA) said on 7.8.2006 that council taxes would have to rise by a large amount to pay for public services such as housing and education for immigrants.

4. BBC Television (London ‘region’) said in August 2006 that an organisation representing estate agents said that the arrival of so many east european migrant workers had put up rents due to increasing demand (for rented accommodation).

5. John Bird, the editor of the Big Issue (which raises money for the homeless) said (in an article for the Daily Mail of 27.8.2006) that the principle of free movement within the EU meant that we were rapidly europeanising the needy and dependent. He predicted that there would be more Czechs, Lithuanians and Poles sleeping rough or crammed ten-to-room in flats in the UK or “hanging around on street corners seeking black market work.” He said over 40, 000 east europeans in the UK are on benefit and that, as the EU expands, we will “import more poverty.” Mr. Bird, who used to be homeless himself, said that the UK would – thanks to the EU – become a social dumping ground.

* Homeless Link (a charity for the homeless) said on 2.9.2006 that about 15% of 4356 people it has surveyed in day and night shelters were from eastern europe.

6. The Sunday Telegraph said on 8.10.2006 that schools (including at Boston in Lincolnshire) were being forced to take eastern european pupils – above the maximum number of pupils agreed with the local education authorities.

7. Over 50, 000 Poles have applied for state benefits in the UK for their offspring back home, the Mail on Sunday reported on 13.8.2006.

8. Peterborough Conservative MP Stewart Jackson told Conservative Home (website) on 15.8.2006 that the result of eastern european immigration in his constituency was – the financial burden falling on the community, higher taxes, social tensions (as slum landlords buy up properties to house eastern european families thus changing the character of the areas), unscrupulous employers taking on thousands of workers on the ‘black market’ with the local English and the Pakistani and Portuguese communities feeling left abandoned. Mr. Jackson said that supporters of the mass influx from eastern europe argued from “their well-heeled towns in the south of England” that immigration controls “offended against the traditions of the free flow of capital and labour.” He added “mass immigration is not a cost-free policy.”

9. The Daily Express (in late August 2006) said that up to 10, 000 east european migrants will be entitled to claim tax credits paid for by the British taxpayer. A loophole allows eastern europeans in the UK to claim up to £1 billion. Migrants who earned less than £5220 a year in the previous year can get £2345 working tax credit from British taxpayers.

10. Reading Council admitted in July 2006 that there were 10, 000 eastern european migrants in the town. But unemployment in Reading has actually gone up by between 38% and 45% since the eastern europeans arrived there – proof that British people are ending up or staying jobless as outsiders elbow them out of the way. Nigel Farage MEP, of the anti-EU UK Independence Party, said on 7.8.2006 “These figures compiled by the House of Commons library are shocking. Across the Home Counties (south-east of England area around London) the unemployment rate is shooting up. Yet nobody dares make the link. Unlimited eastern European immigration is having a very real effect upon employment prospects. This may be uncomfortable for some but that does not make it any less true.”

11. Damien Green, the Conservative opposition Immigration minister, said on 30.12.2005 that the Workers Registration Scheme (set up by Blair to monitor to the eastern european influx) should be got rid off because eastern europeans arriving in the UK were put off by the £70 charge to register and were just disappearing into the ‘black market’.

12. Frank Field, the eurosceptic Labour MP, said on Channel Four Television News at 7.12 pm on 22.8.2006 “Of all the graduate nurses in my (Birkenhead) constituency none have got jobs. We don’t have a managed (immigration) policy. We are training more nurses and doctors but not limiting (nurses and doctors) from coming in. Even Sir Digby Jones (former head of the Confederation of British Industry) says that we have to be careful on the huge influx from eastern europe.”

Frank Field, the Labour MP said on BBC 2 Television Newsnight on 6.7.2006 at 10.55 pm “This (influx) is bad news for this country. Jobs are not available for all home-grown doctors. 600, 000 is more than the number of houses we have built for low income people. This is a transformation of the like we have never seen before. Eleven EU nations refused to sign up to letting in east european immigrants. Only three nations opened up their labour markets including the UK. We aren’t prepared to continue this mass immigration unchecked. I’m not anti-foreigner or xenophobic. But we should have a Parliamentary debate.”

13. Ann Leslie, the Daily Mail columnist, said on Sky Television News at 11.35 pm on 22.8.2006 “It is unsustainable (the huge influx of migrant workers from eastern europe). I was accused by the (leftist) Guardian of being a ‘little Englander’ for saying this before – but now the majority of people agree with me. The middle class and the fruit farms in the UK love the cheap labour that comes from eastern europe. Low paid immigrants keep the wages down. But it is unsustainable because they (the immigrants) settle here after a year or so and then bring their families over.”

14. Gwyneth Dunwoody, the Labour MP for Crewe and Nantwich, told Blair in July 2006 “A large influx of migrants from the new EU states (of eastern europe) is putting schools and housing under strain in some areas.”

15. The Times newspaper of 31.7.2006 said that the police in Kerrier (Cornwall) had claimed that there had been an increase in drinking, noise and the number of massage parlours. Police at Boston (Lincolnshire) reported a rise in road traffic accidents. A Lincolnshire police stop-and-check initiative said in mid-2006 found that 50% of drivers were committing an offence and 97% of that 50% were migrant workers. House price inflation had been caused, the Times also said, at Boston due to landlords bulk-buying properties for ‘labour providers’ (i.e. local firms employing cheap labour from eastern europe). Areas had become eastern european ghettos, the newspaper reported. There are at least 2500 east europeans working in the small town of Kerrier and over 8000 in the Boston area of Lincolnshire.

16. Joe Moran, Branch Secretary of Liverpool UK Independence Party, wrote (in support of the comments of Frank Field, above) in a letter to the Liverpool Daily Echo in August 2006 that east europeans in the UK were (allegedly) responsible for gun running and prostitution.

17. The Mayor of the Polish town of Wroclaw, Rafal Dutkiewicz, told BBC 2 Television Newsnight on 6.7.2006 at 10.55 pm “We are worried at losing talented people. We can’t get investment if skilled workers leave.” Salaries in the UK for skilled workers are 17 times higher than in Poland. One in ten doctors and 25% of anaesthetists have left Poland since 1.5.2004.

Rowan Giertych, the Polish Education Minister, said “I was against Poland participating (i.e. joining) the EU. Now we have a brain drain. The UK picks up our talented workers.”

18. The President of Poland said on 27.1.2006 “The UK is attracting too many talented Poles.” (The quote comes from an e-mail sent to the UK by the British Embassy in Warsaw and obtained by BBC 2 Television Newnight in early August 2006 using the Freedom of Information Act.

19. Lord Bruce-Lockhart, the leading Kent County Council Conservative and Chairman of the Local Government Association, said (at 10.41 pm on BBC 2 Television Newsnight on 22.8.2006) (when asked by Gavin Esler, Newsnight presenter, if council taxes would go up as a result of the huge eastern european influx) “There has been a huge increase in the number of asylum seekers and people coming to the UK from eastern europe. There are seven million people in the UK which the Government classifies as economically inactive. Surely we should be helping them (to find jobs instead of bringing in people from eastern europe)?"

Britannist

The Polish Prime Minister has criticised some Polish migrants who come to the UK. Lech Kacynski was speaking at Downing Street where he stood next to Blair to face questions from the press after the two had held talks on 7.11.2006.

Mr. Kacynski, whose party is eurosceptic in its composition, said “I believe that there are a number of people from Poland (and not only from Poland but from a number of other countries too) who are feckless naturally. But they seek a better life and go abroad. Currently, the UK is the destination of choice for such people but Poland does not shirk its responsibility for such people. These people are doing very well in the UK due to the wages difference (salaries being at least five times as much in the UK for professional workers than in Poland), but claim (social security and other) benefits back in Poland. They are living a fiction. This is something which we would like to do without.”

Reports said that Blair was not aware until later (when he got a full translation of the comments) that the Polish Prime Minister had, effectively, been criticising him for taking in so many people who were claiming benefit in their home country while working in the UK.

The Polish Prime Minister also said that many Poles who had come to the UK in search of work ended up jobless and homeless.

* Westminster City Council said in a report in October 2006 that half its homeless are from eastern europe – causing substantial extra cost to local council taxpayers.

Moving Target

Robin

I like the way that the Polish president said that there were many "feckless " Polish people coming into the UK, but a Downing Street spokesman said that the Polish president didn`t say that feckless people were coming to the UK.

Britannist

This shabby Government only hears what it wants to hear.

Of the two Prime Ministers, I certainly would rather believe the Polish chap than 'Tony' B-liar.

Moving Target

Apologies for my previous post - or lack of it.

With the Polish immigration it's a shame that they don't send some their politicians - they sound like they have a whole lot more integrity than ours.

Do you think they'd arrange a swap?

Britannist

A swap would entail sending Blair to run Poland - which would be an insult to the people of Poland. Wouldn't be fare on the Poles, sending them our rejects.

Moving Target

Yes, you've seen through the obvious flaw

The Polish people aren't stupid enough to put up with it.

But wait a minute, we put up with it... :x

Britannist

Well, if we're talking specifically about us English people - then we didn't really put up with Blair. We actually voted him out at the last General Election. More people in England voted Conservative than Labour in last year's General Election.

In fact, the UK as a whole did not really re-elected the Blair regime in May 2005. Labour got a lower percentage share of the vote 'winning' last year's General Election than the former Labour Prime Minister James Calllaghan got in losing the 1979 General Election.

Outdated constituency boundaries in England benefit Blair. Although the pro-Labour bias is slightly reduced due to boundary changes effective from 1.1.2007, the boundaries that the next UK General Election will be fought on will still be favourable to Blair's Lie-bour Party :evil: .