Thoughts on immigration ?

mr_eddy

I have been reading a fair bit about the forthcoming lift on work place rules for Romanian people living / working and studying in the UK.

What are people's thoughts on this and indeed on a multi cultural / european UK ?

Personally I welcome anyone who is hard working and is willing to chip in to our economy, my girlfriend is Slovakian, she has been in the UK since 2007 when we met and has worked full time since moving here paying taxes and boosting the local economy.

With record levels of debt and a reduction in our national credit score surely people willing to work and pay taxes regardless of where they are from is a good thing.

I do believe that in the UK there is a social problem whereby 2nd or 3rd generation families who have been brought up in a 'money for nothing' society believe its their right to welfare support. Take my street for example, its fairly modest and most people on my road I would say are 'working' class, however I would estimate from talking to our neighbours etc that at least 50% of the households are unemployed on benefits, I would hazard a guess that a good chunk of those families have people in the household eligable for work.

What are people's thoughts ?

daviesee

Can.
Of.
Worms.

I'll get the popcorn ready.

mr_eddy

Yep we shall see.

danlikesbikes

mr_eddy wrote:

I have been reading a fair bit about the forthcoming lift on work place rules for Romanian people living / working and studying in the UK.

What are people's thoughts on this and indeed on a multi cultural / european UK ?

Personally I welcome anyone who is hard working and is willing to chip in to our economy, my girlfriend is Slovakian, she has been in the UK since 2007 when we met and has worked full time since moving here paying taxes and boosting the local economy.

With record levels of debt and a reduction in our national credit score surely people willing to work and pay taxes regardless of where they are from is a good thing.

I do believe that in the UK there is a social problem whereby 2nd or 3rd generation families who have been brought up in a 'money for nothing' society believe its their right to welfare support. Take my street for example, its fairly modest and most people on my road I would say are 'working' class, however I would estimate from talking to our neighbours etc that at least 50% of the households are unemployed on benefits, I would hazard a guess that a good chunk of those families have people in the household eligable for work.

What are people's thoughts ?

If you want my personal opinion its that it is a good thing, we do need to boost our economy & I welcome people who come to work as I have worked in the EU myself and find it much easier in a free state than when I worked elsewhere in the world.

I would however just ask you a question on your comment above (now in bold) I'm not sure if you are suggesting that your issue is that all 2nd & 3rd generation migrants and their reliance on welfare support is an issue or that in your street there are families who you feel should/could work but don't and some of them are 2nd/3rd generation and some are not.

I'm not having a go or trying to cause an argument (not really my style) but more for clarification.

As an example in our street we are pretty much a mixed bunch in terms of class & a mixed bunch in terms of origin. However it is a fact there are a significantly higher % of unemployed families that are Caucasian British families who could/should be working but are claiming welfare with no intention of working than those who you could call recent migrants.

Tom Dean

Danlikesbikes wrote:

families who could/should be working but are claiming welfare with no intention of working

Is there any EVIDENCE that this applies to significant numbers of people? ('The Daily Mail says so' doesn't count btw.)

solosuperia

Not entirely off subject:-
Primary school has no native English speakers!!!!!!
Where?
Peterborough......Eh! thats not a surprise.
Gladstone Primary School has 440 pupils not one of them has English as their first language.
Despite the language barrier the school has scored highly in the Ofsted reports.
Don't say a lot for the other schools where all the pupils have English as their first language..........

I can see this situation increasing, mind you if the kids are getting a good education and I'm sure they will be fluent in English, they should be able to exploit their bilingual capabilities in the jobs market.

I read somewhere that London is less than 50% "White British" and the decline amounted to 600,000 between the last censuses! and has be given the soubriquet "White Flight".
Mind you village I live in has, well must approaching 40% ex Londonders......I tell everyone I'm here on missionary work.

GiantMike

THEY should not be allowed to come here. And if THEY do, I'll leave and go to Australia. Or Spain. Or Scotland. No, maybe not Scotland.

danlikesbikes

Tom Dean wrote:

Danlikesbikes wrote:

families who could/should be working but are claiming welfare with no intention of working

Is there any EVIDENCE that this applies to significant numbers of people? ('The Daily Mail says so' doesn't count btw.)

Significant evidence in my street yes - of the general population I don't know.

Not a follower of the Daily Fail but can imagine that being one of their headlines.

Of the evidence it is first hand from members of the families themselves, we are quite a small cul-de-sac and most people know each other & have attended enough BBQ's with families over the years who have stated they were happier and better off not working and "the council can pay for it" than getting a job and working. Obviously this might not be the evidence your looking for & it could be them boosting and showing bravado whilst their real intention is to find a job and get employed work.

The flip side is that there is only one family not in work who are not born in the UK and moved over circa 6-7 years ago (around the time I moved into the street) husband, wife and school age child. Husband moved over to work with the wife (house wife) looking after their young child. Husband was injured at work and unable to return to the same job & with reduced movement would struggle to find full time employment (I have spoken to him quite a bit and he does appear to be trying to get work) the wife is now his full time carer & their young child is now around 10/11 I guess so apart from a paper round not able to contribute.

Above is my proof for what its worth, but as I said it has to be taken on face value but comes direct from both sides.

My question was more aimed at stating the example that in our street the numbers suggest in terms of unemployed families claiming benefit there was a higher % of indigenous white families than those classed as migrants of a 1st/2nd/3rd being brought up to believe that it was OK to not want to work.

slowsider

SoloSuperia wrote:

I'm sure they will be fluent in English,
<snip>
Mind you village I live in has, well must approaching 40% ex Londonders......

Londonders - they're from Londond, are they ?

and what does 'well must approaching' mean ?


Are you fluent in English yourself ?

team47b

I have no intention of going to the UK. I have no intention of working. I do not claim any benefits.

If I moved to the UK, I would not work or claim benefits so I guess I would not be welcome under your criteria.

fast as fupp

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree ... th-exposed

tiredofwhiners

mr_eddy wrote:

I do believe that in the UK there is a social problem whereby 2nd or 3rd generation families who have been brought up in a 'money for nothing' society believe its their right to welfare support.

Thats nothing to do with immigration though - thats entirely a problem of being brought up under Blair and Brown.

There's nothing wrong with immigration as long as they are net contributors - problems only occur when a tax payer leaves and a net taker arrives. people worry too much about what the UK will be like in 100 years 'at this rate' as the desires of the Uk population at that time are not going to care one bit about what you or I think it should be.

The door can be shut at any time, should the electorate decide.

danlikesbikes

team47b wrote:

I have no intention of going to the UK. I have no intention of working. I do not claim any benefits.

If I moved to the UK, I would not work or claim benefits so I guess I would not be welcome under your criteria.

You'd be welcome as long as you don't read the Daily Mail or live next door to a chap called Alan Partridge. If you don't know who he is then check him out on Google or Youtube.

solosuperia

slowsider wrote:

SoloSuperia wrote:

I'm sure they will be fluent in English,
<snip>
Mind you village I live in has, well must approaching 40% ex Londonders......

Londonders - they're from Londond, are they ?

and what does 'well must approaching' mean ?


Are you fluent in English yourself ?

As you can see my first language is pure b*****ks, unsullied by anything that might be called intelligence
The nurse hasn't been round with my tablets yet! and I haven't had a lie down this afternoon.

Frank the tank

fast as fupp wrote:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2012/dec/14/worklessness-culture-myth-exposed

Last week on the local east midlands news it had an item where 1,700 people had applied for eight jobs at Costa coffee (they'd be min wage I would guess)

So where are all these jobs that the "workshy" won't do.

If there are not enough jobs for those who want to work, those not bothered about scraping along on benefits have no chance of being "pressganged" into work.

tiredofwhiners

Frank the tank wrote:

So where are all these jobs that the "workshy" won't do.

Not in Costa coffee for certain as that appears to be quite a nice, warm, trendy place to work. I'm sure its not as good as it appears but it beats cleaning toilets, washing cars, sweeping streets, collecting rubbish and all sorts of manual jobs out there.

The issue is that there are lots of folks who feel that they are 'too good' for a given job, and will hang onto benefits until the perfect role comes along for them - without realising every year, there's a new generation of school and university leavers who may well be better qualified.

Just looking at Monster.co.uk, there are refuse collector, cleaners, lorry drivers to name a few and I guess none of the 1,500 applicants have applied there. Thats without looking in the local papers.

I'm taking a new job - not what I want but hey, it'll pay the bills.

finchy

tiredofwhiners wrote:

mr_eddy wrote:

I do believe that in the UK there is a social problem whereby 2nd or 3rd generation families who have been brought up in a 'money for nothing' society believe its their right to welfare support.

Thats nothing to do with immigration though - thats entirely a problem of being brought up under Blair and Brown

I'm not Blair and Brown's biggest fan, but how can long-term unemployment through 2 or 3 generations be blamed on being brought up under those 2? Anybody who was brought up under B & B would not yet have offspring who are old enough to enter the job market.

Not only that, but welfare spending in real terms was lower for most of Labour's 13 years than it was under the previous Tory administrations, despite an increasing population:



I don't think that this is entirely due to Labour's economic policies - much of it was probably just because of the economic cycle and the fact that the economy was overheating, but I'd love to know where this right-wing idea that Labour is the party of high welfare bills comes from.

pipipi

I'm happy with immigration for anyone who wants to work. Or even play football.

But it does seem to make it harder for everyone else to get a job. Or into the football team.

I don't see why people on benefits for not being able to get a job can't do some volunteer jobs, charity shops etc. although its not that simple

pinno

Can we do a trade off ? We ship a few boatloads of tracksuit clad delinquent layabouts with no repertoire of vocabulary of words with more than 1 syllable to Romainia in some sort of exchange ? I'd be up for that.

SiF123

johnfinch wrote:

tiredofwhiners wrote:

mr_eddy wrote:

I do believe that in the UK there is a social problem whereby 2nd or 3rd generation families who have been brought up in a 'money for nothing' society believe its their right to welfare support.

Thats nothing to do with immigration though - thats entirely a problem of being brought up under Blair and Brown

I'm not Blair and Brown's biggest fan, but how can long-term unemployment through 2 or 3 generations be blamed on being brought up under those 2? Anybody who was brought up under B & B would not yet have offspring who are old enough to enter the job market.

Not only that, but welfare spending in real terms was lower for most of Labour's 13 years than it was under the previous Tory administrations, despite an increasing population:



I don't think that this is entirely due to Labour's economic policies - much of it was probably just because of the economic cycle and the fact that the economy was overheating, but I'd love to know where this right-wing idea that Labour is the party of high welfare bills comes from.

Err, by showing a graph that demonstrates the fact. This shows an increase in the welfare budget over their tenture, upto the start of the recession. Under normal cycles it should have fallen, given full employment. So, we start the recession with a record level of welfare spend, as well as a record level of borrowing. You don't have to be right-wing to spot that this is plain suicide.

Or are you being ironic ??

AchillesLeftKnee

Cheap-arse tactic to keep CPI low. That's it really. See the service industry in the south for details.

Daz555

Poorly controlled immigration is dangerous. Well controlled immigration is a necessity.

finchy

SiF123 wrote:

johnfinch wrote:

tiredofwhiners wrote:

mr_eddy wrote:

I do believe that in the UK there is a social problem whereby 2nd or 3rd generation families who have been brought up in a 'money for nothing' society believe its their right to welfare support.

Thats nothing to do with immigration though - thats entirely a problem of being brought up under Blair and Brown

I'm not Blair and Brown's biggest fan, but how can long-term unemployment through 2 or 3 generations be blamed on being brought up under those 2? Anybody who was brought up under B & B would not yet have offspring who are old enough to enter the job market.

Not only that, but welfare spending in real terms was lower for most of Labour's 13 years than it was under the previous Tory administrations, despite an increasing population:



I don't think that this is entirely due to Labour's economic policies - much of it was probably just because of the economic cycle and the fact that the economy was overheating, but I'd love to know where this right-wing idea that Labour is the party of high welfare bills comes from.

Err, by showing a graph that demonstrates the fact. This shows an increase in the welfare budget over their tenture, upto the start of the recession. Under normal cycles it should have fallen, given full employment. So, we start the recession with a record level of welfare spend, as well as a record level of borrowing. You don't have to be right-wing to spot that this is plain suicide.

Or are you being ironic ??

It was a straight comparison of welfare bills between the two parties. Obviously there was a rise towards the end of Labour's reign, but it was the idea that Blair and Brown somehow managed to create 2 or 3 generations of layabouts that I don't understand. There are also the complicating factors of rising house prices and rents during the Blair/Brown years, which presumably means that housing benefits went up a lot as well, but seeing as this would have gone straight into the landlords' pockets, I again fail how to see how this would have spawned a something-for-nothing society.

dave35

This country is full-no room at the Inn.
NHS is on it's knees,benefit system is a joke.
Housing is getting worse-how much more greenery is left to build on for all these new people coming over?
In simple terms-stay where you are.

Frank the tank

tiredofwhiners wrote:

Frank the tank wrote:

So where are all these jobs that the "workshy" won't do.

Not in Costa coffee for certain as that appears to be quite a nice, warm, trendy place to work. I'm sure its not as good as it appears but it beats cleaning toilets, washing cars, sweeping streets, collecting rubbish and all sorts of manual jobs out there.

The issue is that there are lots of folks who feel that they are 'too good' for a given job, and will hang onto benefits until the perfect role comes along for them - without realising every year, there's a new generation of school and university leavers who may well be better qualified.

Just looking at Monster.co.uk, there are refuse collector, cleaners, lorry drivers to name a few and I guess none of the 1,500 applicants have applied there. Thats without looking in the local papers.

I'm taking a new job - not what I want but hey, it'll pay the bills.

But do they pay the bills, I would suggest they're not vey well paid and don't pay the bills and folk doing them would still require some kind of benefit to give them a living wage.

But you and I would never agree on owt so I'll just have to agree to dis-agree to keep it ammicable.

Tom Dean

deleted

tiredofwhiners

Frank the tank wrote:

But do they pay the bills, I would suggest they're not vey well paid and don't pay the bills and folk doing them would still require some kind of benefit to give them a living wage.

But you and I would never agree on owt so I'll just have to agree to dis-agree to keep it ammicable.

they may not pay 100% of the bills but it goes some way to reducing dependency upon the welfare state . I concur its not 100% but as many folks know, its easier to get a job when you are in work than not.

I have no problem with a 'living wage' as long as its for a 'fair days work'. The problem is that folks who want a living wage, want more than their job can actually support, and want more than freebies from the state provides. Something has to give and at the moment, the private sector is under assault from overseas competition and paying folks on low wages, even more, isn't going to help the better paid jobs stay in the UK.

mr_eddy

In ref to the 3rd comment there seems to be some confusion - my point abourt 2/3rd generation welfare support was based on british caucasian famalies. I completely agree, from my personal experience those whotend to rely on welfare handouts (especially in my local area) are 90% british born white famalies. This is my point, in my experience its EU workers who tend to have a good work ethic.

I welcome more hard working individuals from all areas of Europe and I hope the powers that be find a way to ensure that only those who are in genuine need of welfare get it, also there needs to be better systems in place to ensure that welfare payouts pay for only what is requried:

Take my GF's home town in Slovakia for example if you believe that you cannot work for whatever reason then you do get welfare support but instead of just money you get your support in practical solutions so for example instead of money towards food you get given food vouchers - these vouchers can be used at the supermarkets for essential food items only - You can use food vouchers to buy smokes / alcohol / chocolate cake etc.

In addition if you feel that you need the internet to search for a job then you given a pre programmed 3G router that allows access to only certain types of sites.

Whilst I admit that these measures are a bit big brother like it does serve to make full time employment more attractive.

I think that is the point here - in the UK there is a system in place that makes living off benefits just as rewarding in terms of lifestyle and quality of life as you get if working full time. If we put in place measures so that those who chose to remain unemployed despite having the ability to work are forced to accept a lower standard with regards to entertainment / food provisions etc then it would hopefully encourage work.

Cleat Eastwood

I favour it - no boundaries - ever. Why should a climate of distrust and fear be encouraged when all thats happening is new people with new stories and old lives are coming to visit.

tiredofwhiners

mr_eddy wrote:

I think that is the point here - in the UK there is a system in place that makes living off benefits just as rewarding in terms of lifestyle and quality of life as you get if working full time. If we put in place measures so that those who chose to remain unemployed despite having the ability to work are forced to accept a lower standard with regards to entertainment / food provisions etc then it would hopefully encourage work.

Agree fully - but it is unlikely to happen for years as the left and centre refuse to even contemplate the idea of removing anything from non-workers. Thats because much of their electoral base lies in those demographics.

What will be interesting is that when Labour forme the next government (which I am sure they will do), how much of the current policies will they undo. Very little I suspect as the next government will find the coffers are still as empty as when they left them. And the public will not be voting for more debt to pay to the non-productive, non-retirement welfare state.

Tom Butcher

I think uncontrolled immigration is dangerous - you create a situation where there are definite distinct communities within one country then long term that has the potential to cause conflict and that's evidenced the world over. A certain rate of immigration that allows for integration into existing society - no problem - but huge influxes of population over a short period I think is risky.

In addition I don't think blaming white people for benefits claims and saying immigrants are typically much harder working than the indigenous population is backed up by facts - if you look at areas of cities where immigrants have typically settled my bet would be benefits claims would be as high as similarly poor areas where they haven't. At the very least claims that there is an underclass of scroungers who are almost all white needs backing up with some facts (not anecdotes from your street) otherwise it's just as much rubbish as saying all blacks are lazy or similar tosh.