Current Affairs EU In or Out

[Methuselah]

But its not 'the free movement of people across the EU' is it, its the free movement of people from Africa and the Middle East into the EU.

Bruce, let me ask you a hypothetical question. If China changed their laws on emigration and 10m Chinese decided to come to the UK, you would be comfortable with that?

 

[Number_25]

Utopia overnight will come at a price.......

I ask of you, go to a Momentum meeting.

 

[Number_25]

But its not 'the free movement of people across the EU' is it, its the free movement of people from Africa and the Middle East into the EU.

Bruce, let me ask you a hypothetical question. If China changed their laws on emigration and 10m Chinese decided to come to the UK, you would be comfortable with that?

Whataboutery is so stupid, especially given the hypothetical put forward is complete barmy.

 

[Joey66]

I ask of you, go to a Momentum meeting.

No way ..

 

[Bruce Wayne]

But its not 'the free movement of people across the EU' is it, its the free movement of people from Africa and the Middle East into the EU.

Bruce, let me ask you a hypothetical question. If China changed their laws on emigration and 10m Chinese decided to come to the UK, you would be comfortable with that?

Hardly a likely scenario is it? Why would you up sticks and move to a new country yourself? The vast majority move because they have something definite to move for, be that study or a job. The notion that people just relocate to another country on a whim or in the hope that something will happen when they get there is fanciful in the extreme. Almost as fanciful as a government being able to manage this.

 

[Methuselah]

Hardly a likely scenario is it? Why would you up sticks and move to a new country yourself? The vast majority move because they have something definite to move for, be that study or a job. The notion that people just relocate to another country on a whim or in the hope that something will happen when they get there is fanciful in the extreme. Almost as fanciful as a government being able to manage this.

Interesting you didn't answer the question. 'Hardly a likely scenario is it' Well, if you had told me 40 years ago that the population of the UK would increase by 10m by the time I was 80, my response would probably have been 'hardly a likely scenario'. Sadly, the 'vast majority' are economic migrants and on another tack, we should be considering the morals and ethics of encouraging young people to abandon their homeland, not to mention the skills we also take from those countries which desperately need them. There are two sides to migration: Emigration and immigration.

 

[Bruce Wayne]

Interesting you didn't answer the question. 'Hardly a likely scenario is it' Well, if you had told me 40 years ago that the population of the UK would increase by 10m by the time I was 80, my response would probably have been 'hardly a likely scenario'. Sadly, the 'vast majority' are economic migrants and on another tack, we should be considering the morals and ethics of encouraging young people to abandon their homeland, not to mention the skills we also take from those countries which desperately need them. There are two sides to migration: Emigration and immigration.

There are an estimated 800,000 or so job vacancies in the UK, so yes, hypothesizing that 10 million Chinese folk will rock up is rather silly. If you'd said would I be happy if 800,000 overseas nationals moved to the UK, sure I would.

Yes, there are two sides to migration, but you've overlooked the flow of knowledge and capital that comes with migration. A nice example from my wife's team in the NHS - she had a colleague who was Gambian. He was trained as a lawyer I believe, but worked in an admin role for several years. You might say that has taken skills from Gambia, but he's recently returned to Gambia to take up a very senior government position that he had obtained in large part because of his experience working in the UK. This kind of thing is hugely beneficial, before even mentioning things like remittances. It's no coincidence that eastern European countries have seen huge growth in their GDP since joining the EU, despite large numbers of their citizens migrating west.

 

[Tubey]

Interesting you didn't answer the question. 'Hardly a likely scenario is it' Well, if you had told me 40 years ago that the population of the UK would increase by 10m by the time I was 80, my response would probably have been 'hardly a likely scenario'. Sadly, the 'vast majority' are economic migrants and on another tack, we should be considering the morals and ethics of encouraging young people to abandon their homeland, not to mention the skills we also take from those countries which desperately need them. There are two sides to migration: Emigration and immigration.

The bold bit is key - 40 years ago, meaning your experience is around the 70s/80s, yes?

So your life experience is to see the end of the 'baby boomer' generation, the rise of contraception and the stagnation of population numbers - indeed, in the 70s and 80s the population fell, because of these reasons and a struggling economy.

So, when you see population numbers increase, your go to response is to be alarmed by it, because you haven't experienced it. But simultaneously the generation that followed you have experienced that and relative economic growth to the era you were in, so they don't see immigration as the same problem.

Hence the split on Brexit, and why the younger generation emphasise the economy and living standards over whether a foreigner is moving in down the road.

The reality is somewhere in between - managed migration and population growth is a good thing; key word is 'managed'. But not in the way the Brexiteers would favour that 'management'.

 

[Bruce Wayne]

The bold bit is key - 40 years ago, meaning your experience is around the 70s/80s, yes?

So your life experience is to see the end of the 'baby boomer' generation, the rise of contraception and the stagnation of population numbers - indeed, in the 70s and 80s the population fell, because of these reasons and a struggling economy.

So, when you see population numbers increase, your go to response is to be alarmed by it, because you haven't experienced it. But simultaneously the generation that followed you have experienced that and relative economic growth to the era you were in, so they don't see immigration as the same problem.

Hence the split on Brexit, and why the younger generation emphasise the economy and living standards over whether a foreigner is moving in down the road.

The reality is somewhere in between - managed migration and population growth is a good thing; key word is 'managed'. But not in the way the Brexiteers would favour that 'management'.

With respect though, that's just pandering to the ignorant in the way I mentioned to @neil999 earlier. We've been conducting a pretty clear cut experiment over the past 40 years, and especially the last 14 years since the A8 nations entered the agreement, as we can very clearly compare migrants who arrived to the UK via free movement of people from the EU and those who were accepted into the UK via government managed migration policies.

I challenge you to find a single metric on which those migrants who the government have had no control over have not out-performed those the government have full control over? If you cannot do that, then surely we must put to bed the notion that the government can in any way manage migration?

 

[Tubey]

With respect though, that's just pandering to the ignorant in the way I mentioned to @neil999 earlier. We've been conducting a pretty clear cut experiment over the past 40 years, and especially the last 14 years since the A8 nations entered the agreement, as we can very clearly compare migrants who arrived to the UK via free movement of people from the EU and those who were accepted into the UK via government managed migration policies.

I challenge you to find a single metric on which those migrants who the government have had no control over have not out-performed those the government have full control over? If you cannot do that, then surely we must put to bed the notion that the government can in any way manage migration?

I think you and I are agreeing really, but you have misunderstood me. I just mean managed migration in the sense of what you've been discussing - e.g. not having ridiculous situations where half of China can suddenly arrive. So I mean we can't just have completely open borders - but with that said there's absolutely no doubt in my mind that migration is a net benefit to the UK.

 

[Bruce Wayne]

I think you and I are agreeing really, but you have misunderstood me. I just mean managed migration in the sense of what you've been discussing - e.g. not having ridiculous situations where half of China can suddenly arrive. So I mean we can't just have completely open borders - but with that said there's absolutely no doubt in my mind that migration is a net benefit to the UK.

The thing is, the very concept of managing it supposes a number of things:
1. Vast numbers of people will want to come to a country for no apparent reason, rather than that they have a job/course to come for. This is especially so if access to state welfare is limited, as is the case with EU migrants
2. The government can possibly know enough to manage migration effectively, whether in a macro sense of understanding the talent needs of the whole country in enough time to develop policies accordingly, or on a micro level in knowing more about individual circumstances than the individual and their employer
3. The government won't impose arbitrary and politically motivated numbers because populist cranks project foreigners as the enemy (and frankly I've got zero faith that they wouldn't do just that)

Freedom of movement from the EU overcomes these because it hard boils the right into the very constitution, so politicians can't feck about with it. We've seen the mess involved when the governments of the EU attempted to manage the refugee situation, and it resulted in this daft quota system that tried to distribute people based upon political whims rather than where those people actually wanted to go.

 

[Methuselah]

The bold bit is key - 40 years ago, meaning your experience is around the 70s/80s, yes?

So your life experience is to see the end of the 'baby boomer' generation, the rise of contraception and the stagnation of population numbers - indeed, in the 70s and 80s the population fell, because of these reasons and a struggling economy.

So, when you see population numbers increase, your go to response is to be alarmed by it, because you haven't experienced it. But simultaneously the generation that followed you have experienced that and relative economic growth to the era you were in, so they don't see immigration as the same problem.

Hence the split on Brexit, and why the younger generation emphasise the economy and living standards over whether a foreigner is moving in down the road.

The reality is somewhere in between - managed migration and population growth is a good thing; key word is 'managed'. But not in the way the Brexiteers would favour that 'management'.

Tubey, don't jump to conclusions. I am not alarmed by immigration. What I am alarmed about is when people like Blair and Merkel wake up one morning and think it would be a good idea to open the doors and let everyone in. No planning, which means in fairly short order the infrastructure is creaking. Housing, Jobs, NHS, schools, etc., etc., You don't have to take my word for it, it has happened before your eyes. The thing that really pisses me off is that the Blair's and Merkel's are not affected by it, eg Blair with his multiple homes, private medical cover and so wealthy he doesn't need a job. (Tell me he's not a socialist!). In fact, just to digress, there is a pattern here. Gordon Brown destroyed final salary pensions, didn't affect his pension though, nor that of all the other MP's. Talk about 'champagne socialists'.

 

[Ruairi77]

Tubey, don't jump to conclusions. I am not alarmed by immigration. What I am alarmed about is when people like Blair and Merkel wake up one morning and think it would be a good idea to open the doors and let everyone in. No planning, which means in fairly short order the infrastructure is creaking. Housing, Jobs, NHS, schools, etc., etc., You don't have to take my word for it, it has happened before your eyes. The thing that really pisses me off is that the Blair's and Merkel's are not affected by it, eg Blair with his multiple homes, private medical cover and so wealthy he doesn't need a job. (Tell me he's not a socialist!). In fact, just to digress, there is a pattern here. Gordon Brown destroyed final salary pensions, didn't affect his pension though, nor that of all the other MP's. Talk about 'champagne socialists'.

You're concerned about governments making decisions with no planning and you voted for Brexit?

 

[orchard]

You're concerned about governments making decisions with no planning and you still support a Tory Brexit?

Fixed x

 

[SteveSC]

You're concerned about governments making decisions with no planning and you voted for Brexit?

It was easy for many brexiteers. They don't want those immigrants from Africa and the middle east freely moving through the EU and going to Britain.

He even mentions that himself.