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Thursday 16 October 2008

Living longer, living more miserably

The good news is, we’re all living longer; the bad news is, we’ll be miserable

The ideological dimension to life expectancy

The government would prefer us to believe that the rise in population is down to that bloody good thing, increased life expectancy for all. But as you have perhaps already guessed, the real reason is immigration. We already welcome the equivalent of a town the size of Sunderland every year from abroad; in future, we will welcome even greater numbers. And the point about this influx is that the government views it all as ineluctable, as inevitable, as a fait accompli, as if it were a slightly inclement change in the weather about which it can do nothing. Suggestions that mass immigration on such a level may not be good for Britain — financially, socially, or in any way you care to mention — are met with the blanket cry of ‘racist’. It is a shibboleth still trotted out by politicians of every major party that immigration has on balance been good for the country; the ‘colour’ and ‘vibrant culture’ and ‘diversity’ of the newcomers have, it is argued, inordinately enriched us all. Well, maybe they have — but by all the sorts of stuff you can actually measure, such as crime, education, welfare statistics, they have also impoverished us.

The sheer weight of numbers, regardless of nationality, will hurt us rather than help us. Let us dispense with the notion that we ‘need’ these people to do the jobs which British people are no longer prepared to do. This was rubbish in 1948 and it’s even more nonsensical now. Certainly British people are reluctant to clean someone’s floor for five quid per hour, but they might well do it for eight or ten quid an hour — in other words, at the sort of wages they have become accustomed to receiving. And if that is too expensive, then the jobs will surely disappear, unless I am misunderstanding the nature of the market.

Few of those who migrate here over the next ten years will take up highly skilled occupations; few will pay high levels of tax. Most will pay little or no tax and will, instead, be subsidised both at a national level and also through local councils which, increasingly, complain that they are finding it impossible to cope. With a foreign workforce characterised by low skills, low aspirations and poor living conditions, we will see higher crime levels — and an indigenous working-class population which resents the downward pressure upon its wages and the transformation, once again, of its local community. Yet they will be told that it is good for the country, that the migrants are economically vital and will, beyond such crass pecuniary matters, add to the rich tapestry of human life. By then, I reckon, they will be even more disinclined to believe such guff than they are now. In short, we look forward to a Britain in which more and more land is covered by cheap housing, in which our transport, health and education infrastructures are stretched well beyond breaking point. Something to look forward to, then, in those extra four or five years before we die.

More articles from: Rod Liddle | this section

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