Why is there so much more anti immigration sentiment NOW?

But where will they go after they've been processed?

I was reading something not long before Xmas about the number of asylum seekers who are homeless, and the charity was concerned about the really high number that are set to become homeless once they're processed.

The maths of this don’t quite stack up. Yes the birth rate is slowing and people are living longer, but the population is growing rapidly, through immigration, at a rate greater than is needed to cover the shortfall in people of working age (also the pension age is increasing).

Right wing media and bots with the assignment to destabilise Western culture.

Because right wing newspapers, Tory governments and Reform have been pushing that agenda.

It is about scapegoating and redirecting people's anger at the cost of living and inequalities towards immigrants so they don't question the incompetence and greed at the top...

There has been a lack of long term planning and investment when it comes to affordable housing, healthcare provision, social care and instead of addressing that we have had governments that instead point the finger at immigrants.

Not to mention the fact hat successive governments have done sod all to address illegal immigration, preferring instead to come up with silly and costly gimmicks like the Rwanda scheme to get headlines in the Daily Mail and the Sun.

Add to that social media and the internet.

Changes are not just here, look at the EU current political shifts

But what would you cut?

It's easy to see on the office of national statistics what the visas were granted for.

roughly half - student visas.
about 40% - skilled worker visas for people like NHS and including care workers as we don't have enough here
another 10% or so - family / spouses

If you cut the students, the unis will go broke.
If you cut the skilled worker visas businesses will scream (they do need to jump a lot of hoops to demonstrate skills not easily available in the UK already)
If you cut NHS roles we end up with even fewer nurses and more grannies dying of sepsis

It's not that easy.

The asylum hotel is only required because of deliberate slower processing of asylum seekers

I think it is the illegal immigrants that anger the public. Of course it’s about money, infrastructure and resources but it’s the same principle as inviting someone you want to your house as opposed to them walking in uninvited and unwanted. And yes, I understand about colonialism by the British/the British just invading but it’s not the same and times have changed.

It's easy, but the answer's not popular.

The simplest answer is...it's the easiest dog whistle in the world - "Things are shit, and it's because of those people who aren't from here and aren't like us", and it got even easier after 9/11.

The unfortunate fact, though, is that the birth rate has been dangerously low for decades, and it's falling. We're actually below the point of replacement now (significantly so, in fact), such that we aren't creating enough new humans to replace the ones who're dying. A corollary of that - which holds true for now, and will for at least the next 30 years or so - is that we're also not making enough new workers to replace the ones who're retiring.

Combine that with the fact that (unbeknownst to many) the state pension in this country is not some massive savings pot, but rather paid to the current retirees by the current workers, and you have a massive hole in the budget (on top of the fact that those old buggers are daring to live longer, thus costing more in public services).

That's why we need more and more immigrants; we simply don't have enough workers to support the existing commitments to our old folk, and the proportion of old folk is growing all the time because we're making fewer replacements.

However, this is a long and nuanced answer, and the politicians have run out of other excuses, so...yeah, it's all the immigrants' fault.

Out of your million legal immigrants half of those are students (450k last year). Which we need to keep our universities alive, paying huge fees. Yes, that's definitely changed recently with unis having to tout themselves abroad to pay the bills.

From what I can make of the office of national statistics data, most of the remainder are on work visas coming over as care workers or for the NHS. Some for skilled professions.

Again, people are very keen to talk about cutting immigration but this is why no government has been able to do it. You cut NHS worker visas, the NHS shrieks and patients suffer. You cut students, unis shriek.

Illegal immigration is a whole other box of frogs and of course should be halted but no one seems to have the magic answer. Not locking people up in hotels with nothing to do all day except drink seems to be a generally good idea.

A quick google tells me that we need to be building 300,000 new homes every year to cope with the current rates of migration. We already know how much rents are rising, there’s threads on here almost every day from people who cannot afford to stay in their current homes but cannot find anywhere reasonably priced or suitable to move to. Furthermore schools, hospitals, dentists will be required, increased traffic on roads etc. How can the incoming population not be a drain on current resources, with this is mind? It’s just head in the sand to say that there are only benefits and no negatives to the current rates of mass migration.

People who live in cities are seeing it every day but they try to talk about it and get told it’s social media scaremongering or they need to stop reading the DM. Right here on this thread.

Enormous increases in immigration in the last year or two after the public voted for Brexit in order to be able to have control of immigration. After Brexit the Government had complete control of this immigration (granting visas) and betrayed the public allowing immigration to skyrocket.

Moving towards a million people coming in a year is too much straining all infrastructure and not allowing time for people to integrate properly into existing communities.

https://www.statista.com/statistics/283287/net-migration-figures-of-the-united-kingdom-y-on-y/

Yes the Migration observatory at Oxford university.

During most of the Blair years Murdoch's press was pro Labour.
Now it's right wing, the UK is much poorer and we're constantly told that men arriving in boats are to blame.

The Blair years felt more comfortable financially and everything seemed possible.

Where I grew up in the 70s and early 80s there was terrible National Front and skinhead-type racism. It seemed much more overt and nasty than anything now.

What has changed is the scale of immigration. The Windrush era of mass immigration meant 50-70 000 legal immigrants every year and a fairly negligible amount of illegal immigration. Now mass migration means almost a million legal immigrants per year and illegal immigration somewhere in the hundreds of thousands.

I live in a very multicultural area and would say the recent immigrants are in many ways an improvement on the regular population. However, the competition for jobs and housing has become immense, the pressure on services is incredible and everywhere is just so crowded. You can see it in the amount of traffic. I can't remember the last time I got on a bus that wasn't rammed with people and taking forever to get to it's destination. The greenbelt area around and the local villages are being ruined with horrible identikit housing developments but no additional services.

I know people who live in a nearby village where the local hotel has been turned into an asylum hotel. In a small place the hotel was a big local employer and was important to the local economy (e.g. the village florist supplied all its flowers and the flowers for a lot of the weddings and events there). Now virtually all of the staff have been made redundant, there are no guests using the local pubs and cafes and shops, and a minority of the young men housed in the hotel (but still about 30-40 of them) hang about the village drinking all day.

Islamist terrorism is another factor. As someone with an Irish parent I can say that IRA terrorism really did have an effect on the way the Irish in Britain were perceived and treated in the recent past. Islamism gives rise to the valid perception that there are immigrants who not only fail to integrate but who actively hate the West and who are acting on that hate. Of course there were acts of PLO-type terrorism in the past but nothing on British soil.

That's one of the main reasons. It hasn't changed, it just changed target.

Then you always have more racism/xenophobia during periods of economic struggles. Very convenient scape goat.

Then you have dozens of tv channels, various media in print and online , plus social media. Everyone and anyone can have their little rant , make up stuff and state it as fact and find like minded people ,support and a "community "at the click of a button.

Generally speaking, any population increase is a drain on resources if infrastructure is not addressed - housing, transport, healthcare services, schooling, etc. As we are seeing now.

UK population increase- note the past 25 years.

https://closer.ac.uk/data/estimated-annual-population/

I completely blame government policy on not providing the instrastructure/resources for an increasing population.

Because times are tough and people want someone to blame. Also, the rate of immigration and the speed of change seen in their local neighbourhood makes some people feel uneasy.

But they're not a drain on the UK though. Unless you can point me to some evidence of that?

You are lucky to not have been exposed to much racism. I'm mixed race and grew up in the north in the 80s and 90s and the racism was absolutely horrific and violent on a pretty much daily or weekly basis to the point where I immediately left the country as soon as I could. it always astounds me when I hear of other brown Brits say they're shocked to experience racism for the first time as an adult But yes the Internet has emboldened the racists to come out in full force especially as they know that right wing movements across Europe and the US have had a resurgence in recent years who's going to stop them?

The EU expansion in the early 00s and freedom of movement caused massive migration from eastern Europe in only a couple of years. Which compared to your family and other Asian/afro Caribbean migration which occurred over 30-40 years. This rapid immigration effected a lot of communities. It also depressed wages, leading to wage rise stagnation. Coupled with the education policies of the time pushing a university route rather than a vocational training route has lead to some skills shortages.

Now immigration is from areas of the world which are economically poor and/or war zones...however, it doesn't appear to be refugees from war, but young men coming to the uk.

Therefore, we have a country which has been dramatically effected by unlimited migration for 20 years, now facing unprecedented levels of migration from areas without a direct link to the UK who potentially are a drain on the uk.

Initial figures show that many recent arrivals stay in benefits for considerable time. The immigrants from the 50s to 70s had a positive economic effect.on the uk. Post eu expansion arrivals were also productive in the economy, but put a strain on wages (as I have said), housing, education and health services.

Therefore, there is natural concern that such immigration cannot continue. Personally, I think we need a points type system to allow immigration that benefits the country. The fact that many recent arrivals stay on benefits is probably a short term issue as it most likely is due to their unfamiliarity with the uk.

Sorry should have said assaulted every week.

I am the daughter of a migrant and by heritage Indian. Racism is not as bad as it has ever been. In the 80s and 90s at least one of my family would get assaulted (no point in going to the police), and when at school kids used the N or P words a lot of the teachers just smirked. We have moved on from that, but there has been an increase in racism which is of concern. Family members have certainly remarked that this is the case recently. Some politicians cynically merge legal and illegal migration to mean the same thing, where is in reality most of the staff coming here are wither students or coming for skilled work for example in the NHS or IT.

And you get people saying nonsense like this that isn't anywhere near true.