to think we're all being manipulated

What I am saying is it US directly impacting every one of us.

You are not connecting the dots, with respect.

The NHS isn’t failing due to a lack of investment it was never designed to serve the world. £340 million pa just on health tourists! You are struggling because the NHS can not possibly serve every health requirement of seventy million people - many of whom are aging. It’s a mathematical impossibility for us to continue as we are, you are being sold a lie. That we can have world class health care for ‘free’ -

This becomes even more unlikely if the numbers arriving continue to rise and rise. All of whom will require help, support and pensions as they age.

We really can not continue to allow a ridiculous number of people the right to live here and access all of our services indefinitely whilst bringing all of their extended families and so on.

We are heading towards a crisis, I think we are already there in some parts of the country. A politician isn’t telling me this in hope of having my support ( I would never vote for reform) I can see for myself at the hospital last week that we can not cope. It was utter chaos with nowhere to even sit. We are only in September. My GP can not see my asthmatic child for six weeks, he said it’s because he has too many patients on his books now.

No doubt those in ivory towers look at the 3 star hotels and think the economic migrants are welcome to them, but for those that are freezing in their homes and having to skip meals to clothe their children it looks like the lap of luxury. The two billion wasted is badly required for maternity services that are in terminal decline, extra hospitals and social care. We can not afford to welcome everyone. It has to stop.

100% this have followed him for a long time and he makes soooo much sense. Shame he’s not in the running for PM!

Tell you what, you campaign about that topic and others will campaign about the other issue and if we win we might end up better all round.

I don’t see why do many people object to campaigns on one topic that clearly affects many on the grounds that there are so many other topics to get sorted.

And just for clarity, the NHS spending millions and millions on foreign language interpreters, on site healthcare for immigrant hotels, taxis for those who don’t get on site care, free dentistry, not to mention healthcare tourists with unpaid bills while UK citizens pay into the system get none of those things is not good.

For example, the NHS loses £388 million per year from the unpaid bills of health tourists.

It spends approx £174 million per year on foreign language interpreters.

We don’t know yet how much the taxis and healthcare to hotels is costing but it is rapidly growing.

Thats £500,000,000 per year spent on things that don’t benefit any UK taxpayer. While many U.K. citizens no longer have access to dentistry or effective healthcare.

Why aren’t you complaining about that?

Yes, we have plenty if home grown criminals - we don’t need to import more.

The recent and very sharp rise in rapes is rather interesting though given the recent and very sharp rise in men coming in from countries where apparently rape is illegal (if you listen to their defence in court).

We are currently waiting for the government to release figures - they have been suspiciously reticent on this.

Do point out where I have said that no immigrant contributes to the system. I haven’t assumed any such thing.

The current situation IS having a negative impact directly on many people and indirectly to society. The women and girls already raped harassed and in some cases murdered by men in immigrant hotels were victims of entirely preventable crimes. If those men weren’t here or were held in secure accommodation - those horrific life changing crimes wouldn’t have happened. How many rapes and murders do you find acceptable collateral damage?

We can’t spare £2 billion per year to spend on hotels for immigrants plus however much we are spending on taxis, private healthcare and prosecuting some of them for rape it murder snd fighting the ‘human rights’ lawyers to try and get them removed from our country.

Rachel Reeves has black holes in the budget all over the place and is cutting services and upping taxes wherever she can. We can’t afford this.

@Nestingbirds the point of this thread is to try to explore why certain stories, issues and problems are portrayed as crises, when the reality it much more nuanced.
Why do certain politicians want you to believe there is a crisis? So that you will vote for them to fix it.
Take the 4* hotels issue. My workplace is opposite the hotel in Canary Wharf. That hotel is a total dive. It looks like something out of a bad sitcom about 80s hotels. Like a Crossroads type thing. It’s already not a luxury place to start with and once you change it to have 4 beds per room, sharing a bathroom and no laundry facilities - how much luxury do you think is left?
However, the politicians and the papers can say ‘It’s a luxury 4* hotel overlooking the Thames in the swanky Canary Wharf area’ and people can easily conclude that it’s lovely for the people staying there and that they are experiencing some kind of extended mini-break environment so that you get riled up about it. And then you think ‘why are they getting that when I’m working my fingers to the bone and haven’t had a holiday in 5 years?’ So when that politician comes along and says ‘I can fix that problem and make it go away and you won’t need to be angry anymore’ it’s seductive. But the problem you think it is and the problem you think they have solved is not the full picture. Migrants being housed in hotels is a relatively new approach. You have to ask why that is. What happened previously? What’s the alternative?
I don’t subscribe to the idea that all immigration is bad and everyone is here for a free ride and a life of crime. And there isn’t any evidence to support the narrative that all the people who arrive here are out to murder us in our beds. They just want to live their lives, as we all do.
There is an endless list of things which the state pays for that individual tax payers don’t personally agree with. I don’t like sport, but my taxes go to pay for policing football matches. In my mind that’s wasted taxpayers money. But what’s the alternative if the state doesn’t get involved? Public order offences, violence etc. I’ve got no use for the buildings created for the Olympic that are maintained by the taxpayer now. I could say ‘stop wasting money on them and fix potholes instead’. There’s so much you could get angry about but immigrants is a really easy sell for those politicians wanting to grab power for their own ends.

Aaah, I thought I'd referenced everything! I looked again to find the chart I saw and found as well as the chart that supports my argument, lots of different stats saying different things about trade wages so maybe it's something where I could cherry pick the data to fit my viewpoint? I don't want to do that... My ex was qualified to fit boilers, and his income seemed to be going up year on year even though it was a very stressful and seasonal job (he was self employed). But that might be completely different for roofers and people in other areas of the country. And again different for people employed in the building industry which is so up and down.

I guess, my problem with jobs like gas fitters etc is I can completely see how they need to be paid well and their jobs protected. But from the other side of it, it's absolutely miserable if your boiler breaks in the middle of winter or the plumbing goes and you get told every qualified person is booked up till January. I know from experience it will be because they are working flat out. But wanting hot water isn't exactly a luxury thing that only posh out of touch people care about. It's not a small thing like being able to buy different foods in the market. So I am very conflicted! It should be possible to protect wages and ensure that there are enough people to do the job.

What do you think about articles like this? Are they propaganda (a bit like landlord sob stories, I imagine the Home Builders Federation etc have a bias) or is there something in it? If there is, what's the best way of dealing with it? More apprentice schemes, higher pay and incentives or...
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/government-capital-economics-alan-jones-b2617162.html

Aaah, I thought I'd referenced everything! I looked again to find the chart I saw and found as well as the chart that supports my argument, lots of different stats saying different things about trade wages so maybe it's something where I could cherry pick the data to fit my viewpoint? I don't want to do that... My ex was qualified to fit boilers, and his income seemed to be going up year on year even though it was a very stressful and seasonal job (he was self employed). But that might be completely different for roofers and people in other areas of the country. And again different for people employed in the building industry which is so up and down.

I guess, my problem with jobs like gas fitters etc is I can completely see how they need to be paid well and their jobs protected. But from the other side of it, it's absolutely miserable if your boiler breaks in the middle of winter or the plumbing goes and you get told every qualified person is booked up till January. I know from experience it will be because they are working flat out. But wanting hot water isn't exactly a luxury thing that only posh out of touch people care about. It's not a small thing like being able to buy different foods in the market. So I am very conflicted! It should be possible to protect wages and ensure that there are enough people to do the job.

What do you think about articles like this? Are they propaganda (a bit like landlord sob stories, I imagine the Home Builders Federation etc have a bias) or is there something in it? If there is, what's the best way of dealing with it? More apprentice schemes, higher pay and incentives or...
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/government-capital-economics-alan-jones-b2617162.html

Yes to all the points you’ve pointed out.
Yes, they need to be addressed ASAP

BUT - I just wish you were up in arms the same way about the lack of GPs in this country. Our health system is gone yet you’re pissed off about something that does not impact you on regular basis. I am still waiting on a referral 1 year after being given one. Great isn’t it?! I was given one last week yet I got a letter the other day that it’s been cancelled with no reason and no further dates or information. Fab isn’t it?!

Wish people would demonstrate about our deteriorating NHS, but they would rather complain about immigrants who don’t necessarily affect their daily lives. And before you say the immigrants are using our NHS bla bla, go and find the active thread at the moment about a GP who can’t get a job because the nhs doesn’t want GPs anymore and would rather employ nurses and paramedics.They are deliberating breaking the system down systematically. Why aren’t you up in arms about this?

www.mumsnet.com/talk/am_i_being_unreasonable/5417054-im-a-gp

Is this the substandard Britain you want?
This is what’s infuriating.

Okay I’ll try again

We all agree immigration is too high, I am assuming op is not implying the thousands we can see physically arriving are actually there, and not a collective figment of everyone’s imagination?

Secondly, it seems op accepts nothing much is being done about it, let’s be honest less than nothing is being done about it now. The current government are not even making the smallest of efforts to address it. Actively avoiding the issue I would say.

We know hundreds if not thousands of hotels are now housing and catering for these people for months/years on end. Luxuries many of the tax payers paying for all this can never afford. I assume you realise some people can not afford three meals a day? Or heating? Maybe you have no idea of hardship who knows.

So now it boils down to op being upset that there appears to be ‘division’ and ‘anger’ over this? Is it any surprise when people have been expecting the leaders of this country to control this growing problem for at least FIFTEEN years and more like twenty years?

You are surprised by the ‘hate’ - what you are misinterpreting is the direction of this anger which is mainly at the absolute incompetence of anyone tasked to deal with this. That promise after promise is broken.

Hard working, exhausted tax payers do not want to continue paying billions and billions for this, why is this so hard for you to understand? They want the money to be used for social care, pot holes, improvements in services.

The vast majority of this country did not consent for so much of our money to be wasted like this.

That is why people are incandescent. Nothing to do with big business. Nothing to do with multinationals or anyone’s agenda.

It is about consent. Consent was not given to allow so many undocumented males into our villages and towns. Consent was not given to pay billions to do so. Consent for £600 taxis and endless need. All of it. Do you not see this feel like it is forced on much of the country?

People up and down this country have really had enough.

You’re missing the point, which OP has stated a couple of times. Yes, immigration is a huge problem. But we can’t have a sensible discussion about it because of the division between the working population. Your comment shows it happening in real time. You’re too angry to actually take in what OP is really saying.

It didn't say anything about race though (and from everything I've read about those gangs, culture was far more relevant, although yes far from the only culture to have a huge problem with mistreating women and yes cultures with that problem are attached to many different races).

I'm just a bit wary of treating people as having been racist and needing to be educated with "white people are just as bad" type responses, because we "just know" that's what they really meant, when actually that often isn't what people really mean.

The overwhelming majority in this countdy believe immigration is too high, and action needs to be taken, and I agree.

Nobody on this thread is denying that action needs to be taken to control immigration. Everyone, OP included, is agreeing with you on that.

I am out of this tin hat conspiracy theorist thread, mainly with utter exasperation that some see the issues we are facing now as a storm in a tea cup, whipped up by the media and multinationals/ politicians to suit their agendas. It’s just madness. Even the mathematical argument they can not seem to tolerate or just pure common sense. Almost cult like in the lack of critical thinking skills.

Apparently there is nothing to see here. It’s pure gas lighting 101. Even those that source their own information, don’t watch the news and make up their own minds, are accused of the same thing. The overwhelming majority in this countdy believe immigration is too high, and action needs to be taken, and I agree.

If you consider the country back in 1970 and you look at it now, it’s barely recognisable. Back then most people went to church. We knew all of our neighbours well enough to call them friends. We cooked everything from scratch with everything grown here. Shared values were a given and life had a simplicity about it that is hard to recreate, I am personally horrified by the loss of so much. This subject is far bigger and broader - with such depth.

I lived through the 1970s and look back on it with great fondness but shared values were not a given. The National Front and IRA were active, the general public were furious at the unions over The Winter of Discontent. Youth culture rose up against society in the Punk movement. Football hooliganism was rife. Womens' Lib protesters marched in London. Anti apartheid, CND, animal rights, campaigns against police racism.......I could go on.

Vesta curries, TV dinners, Angel Delight, Smash, Arctic roll, Findus crisy pancakes, Heinz spaghetti hoops and shops like Bejam and Iceland meant nobody needed to cook everything from scratch.

Nearly half our food was imported in the 1970s. Cocoa, tea, coffee, bananas, rice, Danish bacon, New Zealand lamb.......again, I could go on.

Well you might be happy in inner city London but where we live we are most certainly not happy at all. The NHS has billions pumped into it, it’s certainly not under investment! We have run out of housing stock, GPs, hospital beds, social care capacity but you keep telling us it’s the multinationals causing the problem?! Jesus Christ.

@Setenv the post I was replying to refers to Rotherham grooming gangs.

Just a minor point, but why mention race when the poster didn't? I'm not agreeing with their post as such, just interested in why yours brought race into it specifically.

Christ @Nestingbirds. I’m so sorry you believe all that. It clearly bothers you. But the statistics will tell you otherwise. There are not packs of immigrant men attacking women in the streets. There are partners, husbands, ex partners, ex husbands stalking, abusing and killing the women in their lives though. Not that any grooming gangs are ok, but there are white grooming gangs too. The problem of grooming of vulnerable children isn’t racially driven.
We are not at breaking point. NHS and housing waiting lists are long because of years of under investment and underfunding. It’s complex and many are complicit in manipulating funding streams to their own ends. If you have no houses to rent locally - who’s making money out of that? Blaming immigrants is the easy option. Please don’t believe it. The original poster isn’t saying they are being lied to. They are saying that there is a conscious effort to present events in a way to support a dangerous agenda.
And I don’t live in the outer Hebrides. I live and work in inner city London.

Scale of the problem of immigration? When does immigration affect your day to day life?

Hardly!!

The education sector and health sector are screaming and their decline is affecting each and everyone one of us every single day. The poor access to doctors, hospital referrals, the lack of SEND support at schools (and the list goes on) is affecting each family on a personal level and yet you think immigration is a massive problem on a scale? We are literally being denied decent healthcare and education and you’re complaining about a non priority problem. Yes it needs addressing but my goodness there are way more pressing issues.

I am certainly not going to argue with people that have to look up on the bloody internet what life was like in the 1970s! It was my lived experience - end of.

The erosion of our values, of our goodwill, the absolute travesty of having a country where we value democracy and yet the little girls in Rotherham were raped and molesfed over and over again for years, and everyone looked the other way. The anger and resentment has been building and boiling away in the background for years and years. It has nothing at all to do with the media!!

No, it’s not okay. It really is not okay. None of this is okay.

None of this is acceptable to most of the country. The packs of men in hoods terrorising even elderly ladies in the streets, and sexually assautling young girls in plain siight. The people smugglers making a fortune on the misery and exploitation of their prey. The millions and millions paid to France for them to stand by and wave on the boats.
The men that arrive here that are used to ‘’marrying’ oka raping ten year olds because that is normal in their country.

The millions that are sitting around on benefits and in social housing because they can not speak a word of English. The relentless promises that someone somewhere will get a grip on the situation but no one ever does anything.

The vast number of arrivals is taking our country to the brink of collapse with endless waiting lists everywhere. Our housing crisis and moreover the infrastructure of the entire country feels very fragile. At breaking point almost everywhere.

You can say it’s all made up - even as the bbc uncovers the disgusting waste of £600 taxis and the billions we are paying for hotels and all the extras. I for one know it’s true because it’s on our doorstep. We have no houses at all to rent here now.

You can say it’s ‘manipulation’ but back in the real world op it is absolutely real. So you keep living under a rock and say everyone is ‘lying’ to you, which just sounds unhinged quite frankly unless you literally live in the Hebrides, but honestly it’s coming across as denial and total distortion, and outright lying on your part.

I’m not being arrogant. I’m trying to point out to you that the causes of hardship, poverty, disadvantage are not caused by small boats. That’s what we are being told. It’s what the Reform lot want people to believe because the real causes of hardship are multi faceted and cannot be fixed with a sound bite. How our society functions is subject to global macro economic conditions. But Farage wants to be in power so he will say anything and promise anything to get there. And it’s easy to say to people in hardship ‘those illegals are getting more than you. That’s why your life is so tough’ and it doesn’t have to be true. That’s what I’m saying. I’m not trying to be confrontational

@Nestingbirds sorry, but your view of the 70s is based on feelings, not facts. A quick check of the Hansard from the 70s will show you what we were importing (bacon from Denmark, fruit from Spain, even potatoes from Cyprus) And 11% of the population were regular Sunday churchgoers.
That’s how you get manipulated to believe that the past was better than the present. And how Modern Britain is falling apart because of ‘immigrants’.

Nestingbirds
If you consider the country back in 1970 and you look at it now, it’s barely recognisable. Back then most people went to church. We knew all of our neighbours well enough to call them friends. We cooked everything from scratch with everything grown here. Shared values were a given and life had a simplicity about it that is hard to recreate, I am personally horrified by the loss of so much. This subject is far bigger and broader - with such depth.

Don't you mean the 1870s? I was alive in the 1970s and none of your statements about what society was like then resemble anything I saw: your version is barely recognisable. (Church attendance once a month or more was by then down to a bit over one in five of the population, for instance. Twenty-two per cent is not "most".)

In particular, "shared values were a given" is a crock; not if you were gay or female they weren't. Or black. Or disabled. Or had any MH issues. Or got raped, or abused within your marriage. Or even belonged to different political parties; remember Wilson and Heath? And indeed Callaghan and Thatcher? Quite a wide variety of unshared values there, I feel.

(I think you must be posting tongue in cheek.)

I think it’s broader than this and rn the overarching narrative around immigration is being tested. Not just here but in the west generally.

There’s not really a right or wrong to it just one system is pushing one thing and many people are pushing back.