Thousands of Romanians and Bulgarians spotted at the borders

[cunning fergus]

You are wrong by a country mile on both counts.

If the UK and EU systems were analogous then in the UK we would have a situation (and a long standing one at that) whereby laws would be made and imposed by (say) the Houses of Lords or the Monarch.

Both institutions are not elected by the British electorate.

If you want to defend the right of the EU Commission to impose law directly on the British public which bypasses the UK Parliament then you would be supportive of such a position. But I guess you are not right?

Godwin’s Law is only invoked when you use the H-bomb as oppose to a reference to WW2.

That said given your apparent disregard for the long standing and hard fought rights of the British electorate I can see why certain more exotic political systems championed by certain continental European political personalities from the 30s may appeal to you.

Hmm, just check GL (not an expert) and I concede you may have a point...............so I will take it back (rather than edit) its not a country mile.

The rest stands.

 

[Guinness Boy]

Godwin’s Law is only invoked when you use the H-bomb as oppose to a reference to WW2.

Whatever our differences on this thread that's a fantastically creative way of not mentioning Hitler.

Whoops.

 

[soistes]

The point being that there are only so many entry level jobs to go round. The city being a tourist place is lucky in that it has more of these jobs than non-tourist places. There is still a limit on how many of these jobs there are - when I left school there were still not enough to cover the school leavers / students that wanted these jobs - add in immigration and you have even more competition of the few that there are. I'm not for one minute suggesting employers are paying below minimum wage and thus undercutting British youngsters. I'm suggesting that the amount of vacancies hasn't grown but the number of people wanting them has - partly thanks to immigration.

Your argument here seems to be a variant of what is well-known in economics as the "Lump of Labour Fallacy". It's called a fallacy for a reason.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lump_of_labour_fallacy

 

[Pretty pink fairy]

heard on the news today that 75% of people thought immigration should be reduced according to a recent survey ,even people who think it's good for the economy now have doubts
regards
DR

 

[jgmcdee]

If the UK and EU systems were analogous then in the UK we would have a situation (and a long standing one at that) whereby laws would be made and imposed by (say) the Houses of Lords or the Monarch.

Both institutions are not elected by the British electorate.

That's hardly analogous. If the House of Lords or Monarch were chosen by our MPs then it would be closer.

As for the rest, I'm not going to reply to your text except to say that I've obviously not been clear in what I'm trying to say. Put as simply as possible, many of the arguments I hear for the UK leaving the EU could equally apply to Sussex leaving the UK. I'm not passing judgement on their validity, just saying that to me the division between one being good and one being bad seems arbitrary at best.

 

[South Stand Rebel]

lmfao

 

[Hamilton]

heard on the news today that 75% of people thought immigration should be reduced according to a recent survey ,even people who think it's good for the economy now have doubts
regards
DR

It was 77% in fact. A sad statistic that shows how effective the policy of hate and fear can be when times are hard.

 

[Hamilton]

I agree with some of what you say and it's certainly the case (as Peter Wilby's article about the Atlee era in your link perhaps unwittingly make clear) that xenophobia, fear of people who are "different" and hostility to immigrants, have never been the sole prerogative of the right.
In my view, whether or not membership of the EU in its current and likely future incarnation, is beneficial or detrimental to the British working class (in its original sense, a rather smaller population segment than in Atlee's time) is an empirical question, rather than one of ideology or politics. I used to think, in those days when the EEC -- as you rightly name it -- was a purely economic entity, that being part of it would on balance be detrimental to the British working class, and operate mainly in favour of rentiers and business owners, a capitalist club with few safeguards for the interests of the workers. That was why I voted against the UK joining in the referendum of 1975.
Since then, however, with the development of a wider concept of 'social Europe' through the EU, it seems to me (again, on balance, as an empirical matter) that the pendulum has swung somewhat in the other direction: the various regulations and directives (from health and safety at work, pensions, equality, workers' representation, working time, protection of agency workers etc) coming out of the EU have been an important brake on the inexorable shift towards deregulation and erosion of workers' rights, introduced under the Tory goverments of the 80s and 90s, and extended under New Labour (indeed that's why British governments have been so keen on securing 'opt-outs' where they can). So on balance, I now think that continued membership of the EU, with all that comes with it, including free movement of labour, is now a positive for the British working class. As I've mentioned in other posts, as far as I can see, the bulk of reputable economic evidence suggests that there has not been a negative fiscal or economic impact of EU migration, and neither has it had a negative impact on UK employment or unemployment (if anything the evidence is slightly in the other direction with positive impacts of migrants contributing more to taxes than they take from benefits, and the injection of a young, often skilled labour force adding to GDP and GDP per capita, with positive multiplier effects on the existing population).

Finally, and this is where I get onto ideology (and I suspect you will have a very different view), if one is concerned about the working class and economic and social disadvantage (and, to some extent, I am), I see no reason to give particular priority to the "British working class". I'd take a rather more internationalist perspective, and give some weight to the interests of working classes from other places and other countries. While, like most people, I do have some concern about the interests of people I know and care about (my friends and relatives in particular) and want to look after them, when it comes to people I don't know, I see no particular reason to give priority to Brits over Bulgarians, any more than I see a particular reason to give priority to people from England over people from Scotland, or to people from Brighton over people from Newcastle, or to people from Hove over people from Whitehawk -- I just have no reason to give one group a priority over the others and so I don't.

What a fantastic post.

I think I am not quite with you ideologically on your last point, but my reaction is probably purely emotional. I happily cede that success should be based on merit and not because of birthright or birthplace, so guess I need to stew on this one for a bit.

 

[Soulman]

Meanwhile i have just received this.
ADUR DISTRICT COUNCIL HOUSING DEPARTMENT has REFUSED a request for housing from 24th April 2014 from my next door neighbour's Daughter and Son-In-Law and their 3 year old daughter. The Son-In-Law is a Corporal in The Queen's Hussars currently stationed in Paderborn Germany, his wife is also employed by the Family Service Organisation over there.. He is due to retire from the Army on that date having completed TWO tours in Iraq and ONE in Afghanistan.. Adur District Council INSIST that he MUST BE HOMELESS BEFORE THEY CAN CONSIDER HIS APPLICATION FOR HOUSING.

 

[Pretty pink fairy]

It was 77% in fact. A sad statistic that shows how effective the policy of hate and fear can be when times are hard.

I HAVEN'T GOT TIME FOR CLOWNS LIKE YOU, what a statement

 

[Pretty pink fairy]

Meanwhile i have just received this.
ADUR DISTRICT COUNCIL HOUSING DEPARTMENT has REFUSED a request for housing from 24th April 2014 from my next door neighbour's Daughter and Son-In-Law and their 3 year old daughter. The Son-In-Law is a Corporal in The Queen's Hussars currently stationed in Paderborn Germany, his wife is also employed by the Family Service Organisation over there.. He is due to retire from the Army on that date having completed TWO tours in Iraq and ONE in Afghanistan.. Adur District Council INSIST that he MUST BE HOMELESS BEFORE THEY CAN CONSIDER HIS APPLICATION FOR HOUSING.

there's taking the piss and taking the piss
regards
DR

 

[Hamilton]

Meanwhile i have just received this.
ADUR DISTRICT COUNCIL HOUSING DEPARTMENT has REFUSED a request for housing from 24th April 2014 from my next door neighbour's Daughter and Son-In-Law and their 3 year old daughter. The Son-In-Law is a Corporal in The Queen's Hussars currently stationed in Paderborn Germany, his wife is also employed by the Family Service Organisation over there.. He is due to retire from the Army on that date having completed TWO tours in Iraq and ONE in Afghanistan.. Adur District Council INSIST that he MUST BE HOMELESS BEFORE THEY CAN CONSIDER HIS APPLICATION FOR HOUSING.

Quite ridiculous. Madness.

 

[Hamilton]

I HAVEN'T GOT TIME FOR CLOWNS LIKE YOU, what a statement

Clearly you have otherwise you wouldn't have responded. Doh!

 

[cunning fergus]

I agree with some of what you say and it's certainly the case (as Peter Wilby's article about the Atlee era in your link perhaps unwittingly make clear) that xenophobia, fear of people who are "different" and hostility to immigrants, have never been the sole prerogative of the right.
In my view, whether or not membership of the EU in its current and likely future incarnation, is beneficial or detrimental to the British working class (in its original sense, a rather smaller population segment than in Atlee's time) is an empirical question, rather than one of ideology or politics. I used to think, in those days when the EEC -- as you rightly name it -- was a purely economic entity, that being part of it would on balance be detrimental to the British working class, and operate mainly in favour of rentiers and business owners, a capitalist club with few safeguards for the interests of the workers. That was why I voted against the UK joining in the referendum of 1975.
Since then, however, with the development of a wider concept of 'social Europe' through the EU, it seems to me (again, on balance, as an empirical matter) that the pendulum has swung somewhat in the other direction: the various regulations and directives (from health and safety at work, pensions, equality, workers' representation, working time, protection of agency workers etc) coming out of the EU have been an important brake on the inexorable shift towards deregulation and erosion of workers' rights, introduced under the Tory goverments of the 80s and 90s, and extended under New Labour (indeed that's why British governments have been so keen on securing 'opt-outs' where they can). So on balance, I now think that continued membership of the EU, with all that comes with it, including free movement of labour, is now a positive for the British working class. As I've mentioned in other posts, as far as I can see, the bulk of reputable economic evidence suggests that there has not been a negative fiscal or economic impact of EU migration, and neither has it had a negative impact on UK employment or unemployment (if anything the evidence is slightly in the other direction with positive impacts of migrants contributing more to taxes than they take from benefits, and the injection of a young, often skilled labour force adding to GDP and GDP per capita, with positive multiplier effects on the existing population).

Finally, and this is where I get onto ideology (and I suspect you will have a very different view), if one is concerned about the working class and economic and social disadvantage (and, to some extent, I am), I see no reason to give particular priority to the "British working class". I'd take a rather more internationalist perspective, and give some weight to the interests of working classes from other places and other countries. While, like most people, I do have some concern about the interests of people I know and care about (my friends and relatives in particular) and want to look after them, when it comes to people I don't know, I see no particular reason to give priority to Brits over Bulgarians, any more than I see a particular reason to give priority to people from England over people from Scotland, or to people from Brighton over people from Newcastle, or to people from Hove over people from Whitehawk -- I just have no reason to give one group a priority over the others and so I don't.

I appreciate your candour Soistes, and you make some interesting points now we are down to the meat of your sandwich.

There are far too many moving parts to our membership of the EU for it to boil down to some basic left wing right wing argument of good hobbits versus evil orcs, however sadly that is not the way our politicians and media (of all flavours) want the debate on the benefits or otherwise of our membership.

I won’t deny there are benefits to the UK’s EU, because there are; I work for a global business so I can see the mercantile logic and undoubtedly the UK’s membership of Europe over the last few years has done a lot to smooth out old enmities that have existed in the continent since the end of WW2. Although not, I might add, to the extent that the EU should have been given the Nobel peace prize.

Nevertheless there are also many reasons why I think our membership of the EU is not beneficial, these include the costs to business (particularly SMEs) of complying with the ever expanding legislation this is passed by the Commission (check out the Data Protection Regulations), the 2.5% that we pay them in get in VAT, the other EU taxes UK taxpayers pay, the billions UK taxpayers pay in membership fees, the billions UK business and taxpayers pay in fines, and the loss of thousands of UK jobs because of protectionist EU Commission decisions (check out Tate and Lyle in Silvertown).

In some ways these are binary financial issues, but as this thread has demonstrated there are other “costs” now we have embraced EU doctrine such as a free labour market. These costs are quite frankly an attack by international monetarists on the British working class, and the consequential impoverishment of the British working class is a fact. As Wilby highlights in his article the boom years of Polish migration (2002 – 05) GDP over the period was 17.4%, but wages froze for most workers and dropped 4% for the lowest paid. Your UCL report therefore indicates that some people got rich in the boom years, but it was not the British working class, and now with another potential wave of labour washing up to our shores their plight is even more unlikely to improve. Sure, the minimum wage will rise, that will be the bone the capitalists throw the unions.

All this focus on the economy ignores the other financial costs of our open labour markets (or freedom of movement), the crime issues I have highlighted in previous posts are not a matter to get the UK out the EU but it is just another reality, and one that is typically ignored or side stepped. With 14% of our prison population foreign nationals and 334k arrests just in London over last 5 years, the costs of processing just this single aspect is not insignificant for the UK tax payer once the costs of the Police time, the Courts, the Probation, the interpretation etc. are all added together.

Like you I am searching for the credible evidence that would pull all of this together so we can see the numbers………………..all these considerations are not in the UCL report.

But then what is the cost of loss of UK sovereignty, on the victims of crime because of freedom of movement, of those who are on the dole or on minimum wage because of a surplus of low skilled labour?

But then whether we have fact or empirical evidence none of it really matters because as you point out you take a more internationalist approach (dare I say Marxist). That’s entirely cool with me by the way because you have the strength of character and self awareness to understand exactly where you are politically and ideologically. I think we share more in common than we think………………but, my own sense of unity with the workers ends at the English Channel and certainly does not extend to other workers who come from Middle Earth.

If our politicians were as honest about their ideology as you are then the British electorate wouldn’t be beating each other over the head with articles from the Guardian and Mail, they would understand their motives much more coherently. I wonder why they don't express it as clearly as you?

 

[BadFish]

The cost is more than a few pounds of benefits claimed illegally. Plenty of the entry level jobs have been taken by immigrants - try going to get a bar job, a waiting job or a job in one of the discount supermarkets ( all decent starter jobs when I was 16-18 years old ) and almost every single one is filled by an immigrant. There are not enough jobs available for school leavers - partly because of the economic state of the country and also because of the large influx of immigrants.

Someone is making the decision about who gets these jobs. The questions is (if indeed your facts are correct) why are they giving the job to immigrants and not to young British people? I would have thought that employers would prefer to give work to Birtish youth instead of immigrants so perhaps the discussion should be about the areas in which the British kids need to improve so they can become more competitive in the job market.

 

[cunning fergus]

That's hardly analogous. If the House of Lords or Monarch were chosen by our MPs then it would be closer.

As for the rest, I'm not going to reply to your text except to say that I've obviously not been clear in what I'm trying to say. Put as simply as possible, many of the arguments I hear for the UK leaving the EU could equally apply to Sussex leaving the UK. I'm not passing judgement on their validity, just saying that to me the division between one being good and one being bad seems arbitrary at best.

That misses the critical point, but have it your way, if the lords in the houses of lords (or another executive body) were chosen by MPs then you would be entirely comfortable that they could impose laws on the British electorate without the law needing to go through the democratically elected Houses of Parliament?

That situation effectively creates a politburo............but could explain why hardly anyone votes these days though.

 

[BadFish]

Not to mention the drain on education and health.

These are not like the Afro Caribbean's of the sixties, who wanted to come here and integrate. They come here to earn money, use our health service and use our education system. All the while sticking to their own little communities.

A massive generalisation which has been proven inaccurate by a couple of sound studies already posted.

 

[BadFish]

I know that a lot of people think that there has been this massive impact of migration on youth unemployment, but apart from anecdotal material, its hard to find any hard evidence for it. As far as I'm aware, not one credible economic analysis suggests migration from the EU has had a negative impact on the employment or unemployment rates of native Britons (I may be wrong, but if there are any such studies, I'd be interested if someone could post a link to them). Indeed, if I recall correctly, there's good evidence from data at local authority level (I'll try to find the reference if anyone's interested) that youth unemployment actually rose faster during the recession in areas that experienced lower immigration rates.

I was looking at graphs yesterday which showed a similar trend for unemployment in general so I would be interested to see evidence about youth unemployment in particular.

 

[BadFish]

The current immigration is not enriching, it is infact very divisive. They seem to me to want it only their way. They want all of the benefits(as in better earnings, education, healthcare etc) but they do not want to integrate. To be honest I have grown to resent them and do not want anything to do with them. My girlfriend is mixed raced and most of my friends are descendants of west Indians, so I am hardly a racist. The current situation has to change because it is simply not viable.

Who are the 'they' group which you are speaking about? You have a ridiculously broad and generalised starting point in this discussion and it is hard to know who you are talking about.

 

[EDS]

A massive generalisation which has been proven inaccurate by a couple of sound studies already posted.

When were you last in England and actually lived around these immigrants? but yet you tell me I am wrong.

I will love it when bundles arrive in Brighton, then here the whinging