Let's welcome immigration but also prepare for it

Werner Patels

Britain is already overpopulated. Sure, they tell us that we need immigration so that we can afford future pension and welfare payments. But the reality is that a lot of those newcomers cost us more than immigration benefits us in general. In Canada, where I reside, it was revealed that only 25% of current immigrants in the country are net tax contributors. The remainder, 75%, cost the taxpayers C$18 billion a year (that's about £9 billion). Instead of filling a future hole in health care, social security, etc., we are actually creating a deeper and deeper hole.

T

Why must we welcome it?

steve

Fraser & the treacherous BBC fail to mention that it's Muslim birth rates which are high (~5 kids per couple). As the Swedish Democracy Minister Jens Orback said: “We must be open and tolerant towards Islam and Muslims because when we become a minority, they will be so towards us.”

T

Not just Sweden. The most popular baby boy's name in Brussels is now Muhamed.

Fraser Nelson

Steve, personally im glad that the Muslims are having kids (if immigrants weren't, our population would be in terminal decline). And someone has to pay for our pension when we get old, and the UK's native birth rate is dire. T - if you're worried about little Mohammeds in Brussels then dont click on the below link... http://www.spectator.co.uk/coffeehouse/31637/britains-second-most-popular-baby-name.thtml

MMM

When this process is over, I don't think there will be much left of your native Scottland, or Great Britain for that matter. Immigration can of course be a great thing, but not on this scale. To be honest, I don't beleive a majority of Britons welcome this either.

John Whitworth

What the people who worry about this sort of thing worry about is Muslims being in a majority. And I think they are right to worry. Me, I don't worry because I'll be dead. And of course the Muslims might be seduced by Western technology and become just like us. Let's hope so. eh?

Tiberius

Crikey, Fraser, I don't detect any irony there. It's a good job Mark Steyn hasn't come back to the Speccie - he'd shred you! I would suggest rather more self-confident measures to try and deal with your points. As well as controlled immigration, we should transfer the bulk of pension provision to the private sector (the Chilean model), stop abortion at least on demand (there are ample adoptive parents), and encourage bringing up children within marriage (top marks, Dave). None of this will deal with the whole problem, but it gives us a start. I really don't think we can expect a majority Muslim population to fund our slovenly public services (including state pensions) while enacting all those fragrant and benign elements of Sharia Law. Oh, and bye-bye Soho and the City.

Mike

How about a radical thought. Let's not welcome it and let's stop it. Any party that took that position in the next election would win hands down.

jfrancishill

Lo, Britain has lost its way.

Lee Jakeman

We want a five year freeze on immigration, followed by the introduction of a highly selective, Australian-style points system, whereby only those of genuine benefit to the country are allowed in. There should also be a voluntary repatriation scheme with assisted relocation. Why? Because we're a bunch of racists? No. Because "celebrating diversity" means showing respect for other cultures - it doesn't mean accepting the erosion, perversion and dilution of your own culture through the forced infusion of foreign values and traditions. Left-wingers appear to have made it their mission in life to attain absolution for Britain's perceived imperial sins - and towards that end they have demonstrated their willingness to sell us out and trash our own culture in the process. If these morons aren't defeated democratically, they will eventually be defeated violently - and they will only have themselves to blame.

Fraser Nelson

Okay, I have met a wall of opposition from you guys. Tiberius, you're right - I'm pro-immigration. But to me, the issue of Muslim integration and immigration are different. Remember the 7/7 bombers were British born. The strange thing about Islamofascism is that it tends to take root amongst the second generation. Most of the immigrants today are Europeans. Muslims are not coming here in very large numbers at all - what they are doing (as Steve suggests) is having an average 4.7 kids to our 1.8. This, not immigration, is the main driver of our (still small) Muslim population. Of which the vast majority are happily-integrated Brits. Can you guys imagine what Britain would look like without the immigrants? I'm planning a Spectator piece along these lines: it isn't pretty. We'd all be poorer. If you kick out the illegals (never mind the proper ones) London would grind to a halt tomorrow. Mike - ministers reckon we can control only about a third of the immigrants. We can't touch the EU influx, or the asylum seekers we're obliged to take under international law. So any party who proposes to control immigration without also promising to pull out of the EU is lying. For as long as we pay 5.4m Brits not to work, we'll have mass immigration at these levels. Unfilled British jobs is the magnet drawing them here. My solution is to sort out welfare, then immigration levels will slump.

Mike

Fraser - I think your points are well made but centered around a political falsehood that has common currency. That falsehood is that we cannot control immigration. I agree with you around the appalling welfare state we are in, and we need to get a very material number of the 5.4m (and climbing) people of working age not working back into work (DC's Clinton/Wisconsin style welfare reform is very welcome). But looking at immigration I would propose the following 1) Derogate the UK from asylum law. Why do we have to take the vast bulk of European asylum seekers? Why do we accept asylum seekers from Sangette in France - are they seeking asylum from France? Asylum seekers should seek asylum at their point of entry into the EU. If the EU cannot enforce this they we should....this leads nicely into... 2) The EU! We should have an Australian points style system for all immigration and this should cover EU immigrants. If the EU doesn't like it then tough. Frankly I believe we should leave anyway as I struggle to see the benefits of our prolonged membership of this corrupt and foetid political edifice. We never voted to join a broadly undemocratic European Super State whos values and legal statutes are inimical to our British and English-speaking values. We certainly can touch the EU infux if we leave! I'm not proposing that we stop immigration, as immigrants that bring values skills are welcome. But successive governments and this government in particular have ste about destroying our country with uncontrolled immigration. Imagine the population of this country standing at 79m with around 80% of the immigrants that have caused this rise living in the South-east. It would be unrecognisable. Are you suggesting this is OK?

J H Holloway

The problem here is ultimate integration, as much as plain numbers. If 'difference' is insisted upon by many Muslim families, we could end of with a nation within a nation. I have a Bosnian work colleague who assured me that 'Muslims are very good neighbours until they become the majority and then they want everything to change to their way of doing things'. And we all know what happened next. It has to be a risk. And not from the numbers coming in, just from the exponential growth of established communities.
This is worry many people have, and it gets mixed up with immigration, most of which is not Muslim, obviously.

Michael McGowan

Fraser: "So any party which is promising to control immigration without promising to leave the EU is lying." Such as the Tories, for example?

Praguetory

"If you kick out the illegals (never mind the proper ones) London would grind to a halt tomorrow." Fallacy. Employers would have to replace workers with capital or pay them more. Nothing would grind to a halt.

Jack R

The negative effects of the rapid Islamization of the EU (including the UK) is made possible by politicans like Brown and Miliband, who have a Pollyanna view of Islam, despite all the evidence.They are campaigning enthusiastically for millions more Turkish Muslims to come tolive in the UK. Such politicians wrongly presume that the mass of Muslims will 'become like us', despite the 1,500 years of Islamic history, which proves the opposite.

Fraser Nelson

Michael McGowan - yes, such as the Tories. I had them in mind, actually. Mike - can we agree on the following: "we cannot fully control immigration for as long as we are in the EU". Praguetory, yes eventually we'd get back on the feet. My point is that the capital already relies to an incredible degree on the illegals. If they all went on strike tomorrow, we'd notice. JackR, I'm not so pessimistic. Until quite recently, Muslim integration was not an issue, they all wanted to integrate (in Scotland they had Hal-Al Haggis) and the women didn't wear veils. This separatism is a recent thing, and I hope will become fashionable and therefore perish over time.

John Whitworth

I am reminded of the way the debate went in the 1970s. You can't do anything about the unions because, well because you just can't. You say, Fraser, you can't do anything about immigration because of international law, the EU and, well, because you just can't. Mrs Thatcher took on the unions and won. Just like that. What about forgetting about EU rules and just doing what we like. What would they do then? Throw us out? Invade? Or just give in. Try the fine old French method with the EU. Obey the bits you like and don't obey the bits you don't like. And what do they EU do when you're a bad boy? Maybe not so much. As for International Law, does every country obey international law? And what happens to them when they don't? The blue helmets invade with fire and the sword. Do they? Well, I only asked.