To be annoyed that immigration is the main issue for most people in EU debate?

[susanketty]

Whether you are 'in' or 'out', I'm getting tired of immigration being the main issue for people - sure, it will have an impact, but brexit is not going to solve any problems with immigration that people perceive, and immigration fears does not seem to be to me a good enough reason to vote out. And voting in is not going to necessarily lead to a rush of immigrants.

We are not in the Schengen area, we have border control, and EU immigrants make a net contribution to our economy. Brexiteers often say they would like a Norway-esque agreement, which seems to me like all the problems (i.e., free movement of people) with none of the advantages other than being in the trade area (which we are already).

I just think there is more to the debate than immigration and it seems to me like it's been pushed to the front of the agenda to push more people to vote out due to fear.

Getting the best people for the jobs, no matter which country they come from. Being in the EU means we discriminate against people outside the EU. DH and I run a business and to arrange a work visa for a talented person from outside the EU is a bureaucratic nightmare.

The EU is protectionist and racist because it flagrantly makes it more difficult for non-EU citizens to migrate here.

I run a business too, two actually. The bureacratic nightmate would be applicable with EU workers and therefore be a nightmare too.

This argument about only accepting the skilled etc , well we have problems cutting non EU immigration now, it accounts for more than half of net migration, I don't see leaving the EU as a fix for immigration.

One in 9 schools? Is 11%, or lets put it another way 89% of schools don't have that problem. I'll repeat 88% of primary school children get their first choice, not one council last year didn't make an offer to a child in their borough. The children of immigrants are likely to have been here most if not all of their lives, we have known about the need for more school places for years but not funded it. This is not an immigration problem.

The EU is protectionist and racist because it flagrantly makes it more difficult for non-EU citizens to migrate here.

I am a Bremainer but I totally agree with this. DH is from a non-EU country but was educated in the UK in English from the age of 5. According to the NHS, it's fine to test his English (flawless btw), but not those of his colleague who is originally from the subcontinent but has a French passport and whose patients complain constantly that his accent is so strong that they have no idea what he is on about. Testing his English -despite complaints - would apparently be a breach of the EU freedom of movement rules.

I think this is probably an unintended consequence and an over-zealous application of the rules, but it still discriminates unfairly against non-EU candidates (in this case, a highly skilled one).

The bureacratic nightmate would be applicable with EU workers and therefore be a nightmare too Well, that depends on where they are from. The freedom to move to another EU country to work without a work permit is a right for EU nationals and for citizens from the EEA. This means the process is much simpler. For most countries outside the EU / EEA, a work permit is needed and the eligibility of this is on a points based system. Depending on the type of work, a sponsorship licence may be needed too. The process is significantly more complex.

Noone is denying immigration can be of huge benefit to the host country

I couldn't agree more. I have not spoken to anyone who has ever said - stop all immigration.

Britain is a very diverse country, and its great.

The question is, are we really desperate for un limited immigration?

I mean, we were never veering towards a low population crisis where we? We didn't put a call out, like Australia to attract migrants did we.

We are one of the most densely populated countries in Europe.

Some Labourites tell us - how many People came in the 2000's was a mistake, they only predicted 10 thousand, others tell us it was a deliberate ploy to rub the rights nose in it.

But no where was it said " we had to get people to come here, we were under populated " etc.

We are one of the most densely populated countries in the EU, places like Poland are suffering massively from Brain Drain etc, and we simply never needed 4 million Eastern Europeans to come here. As Labour tells it, that was never the plan. It was a mistake and now we are all trying to catch up, back peddling and this strange new spin that we needed 4 million + ( conservative estimate ) to get here and get here rapidly.

Immigrants that have been here for a longer time, are not necessarily in favor of more immigration either!

The EU is protectionist and racist because it flagrantly makes it more difficult for non-EU citizens to migrate here

Many black and ethnic minority voters would agree with that too. They are also very concerned about the rise of the Right Wing on the continent, as well as recognizing many other countries in the EU are generally very racist esp in comparison to the UK.

An article from 2011.

HOW LABOUR LET IN 3 MILLION IMMIGRANTS, IN DEFIANCE OF THE OVERWHELMING WISHES OF THE BRITISH PEOPLE.

The question now is how did it happen and what can be done about it. Was it all a Labour conspiracy? Was it sheer incompetence in government? Or was it wholesale retreat in front of the race relations lobby?

The strongest evidence for conspiracy comes from one of Labour’s own. Andrew Neather, a previously unheard-of speechwriter for Blair, Straw and Blunkett, popped up with an article in the Evening Standard in October 2009 which gave the game away.

Immigration, he wrote, ‘didn’t just happen; the deliberate policy of Ministers from late 2000 . . . was to open up the UK to mass immigration’.

He was at the heart of policy in September 2001, drafting the landmark speech by the then Immigration Minister Barbara Roche, and he reported ‘coming away from some discussions with the clear sense that the policy was intended — even if this wasn’t its main purpose — to rub the Right’s nose in diversity and render their arguments out of date’.

It is not hard to see why Labour’s own apparatchiks supported the policy. Provided that the white working class didn’t cotton on, there were votes in it.

and Mandelson said:

Immigrants? We sent out search parties to get them to come... and made it hard for Britons to get work, says Mandelson

Former minister admits Labour deliberately engineered mass immigration.
Between 1997 and 2010 net migration to Britain totalled 2.2million.

www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2324112/Lord-Mandelson-Immigrants-We-sent-search-parties-hard-Britons-work.html

Important question to Remainiacs and to Brexiters.

Do you think Boris Johnson is a stool pigeon for Cameron?

The best estimates put it at a fall of about 100,000 per year.

Excellent. That will save the Uk from having to build a city the size of Worcester to accommodate them.

Do you think Boris Johnson is a stool pigeon for Cameron?

Yes. I believe that Boris is disrupting the LEAVE campaign with his antics and is deliberately doing so to silence and derail the LEAVE campaign. I believe that Cameron will give him a nice cushy Cabinet seat after this referendum and this had all been agreed between them.

Don't let' kid ourselves - we are not having a sensible debate at all about the pro and cons of LEAVE/REMAIN. The mainstream media is just giving us dog-whistle journalism. "Ohh miss, miss, Boris mentioned Hitler." or 'Oh, sir, sir, Cameron just mentioned the war".

It is very sad that we, as a nation, will be signing away our democratic power because The Sun or Radio 5 or whatever wants to try to provoke outrage over crass comments - on both sides.

What is so ironic about attempting to accuse the LEAVE side of being xenophobic is that if you stand in the street and ask people about the referendum (which I have been doing for weeks now) the strongest supporters of LEAVE are actually the ethnic minorities themselves.

Many of these people have come to this country to flee regimes that are undemocratic and they are the last people who want to hand their power to an undemocratic EU. They value the power they have. They know what it is to let someone else have power or you - and they don't like it.

the strongest supporters of LEAVE are actually the ethnic minorities themselves.

Yes you are right to a large extent. All of my family want Out, as do my Asian neighbours of various faiths and from different parts of the sub-continent. Only the 20 somethings in their families are Remainers, but they are not interested in anything except the 7 Series BMW they are driving.

Could it be that those who have seen a different way of life elsewhere, and those who have not but are nevertheless sensitised to a creeping totalitarianism, tend to be Brexiters?

When Boris was appointed to lead the Brexit campaign my first thought was: is this a set-up?

A clown never does well. He became Mayor only because he promised to put back the Congestion Charging Zone to its original radius - and that's what it did because that was his gift to the Chelsea set. It was useful for me because I had to drive thru SW3 every day, and it also meant I could drive to Knightsbridge without incurring a CC charge. (Livingstone had modified the radius to a smaller area to get more dosh).

Oh dear now thats pushing it a little far do you not think? Totalitarianism?

I've read the other threads about this (which is to be fair why I joined in the end) and have found that one side seems to use statistics and independent research to back its claims, the other lots and lots of exeggeration. I think a lot of you will be very disappointed with the outcome of a brexit situation.

In terms of my vested interest? My business would still function with or without immigration, but I'd be able to take on less projects, and my charges to customers would be signficantly higher which would reduce them amount of work I get.

The second business? Well thats a bit more fun and we only sell a few products to europe per year.

Could it be that those who have seen a different way of life elsewhere, and those who have not but are nevertheless sensitised to a creeping totalitarianism, tend to be Brexiters?

OK - I'll risk it even though the knee-jerk posters on here will probably scream 'racist'

People talk to me about why they are voting IN/OUT. The Asian community are concerned about the increased qualification level for new immigrants into the UK. They are also concerned about EU red tape. The older 1st generation migrants from the Caribbean are particularly keen LEAVE voters. Many openly say that immigration levels are too high.

An Iranian acquaintance says that if we had lived under a totalitarian state - as they had, we would understand the value of democracy and would never be considering giving away any of our powers.

A Zimbabwean told m how he understood and valued democracy more since he had fled to live here.

I have even been told by a Pole that we should LEAVE because of the effect it is having in her home country, where the old are worried about losing so many of their young, able educated citizens.

You need to understand that the power of the British people is held in the hands of the British people and we lend it to a t democratically elected Government to govern our country for us for a period of time - after which time they return power to us, the people, to decide whther we elect them again or elect an alternative Governement to govern us.

That is how Constitutional Government works. It is not how the EU works. You cannot democratically dislodge the EU. They are there forever.

Of course all that will be pooh-poohed by Lab/Lib voter who say they live in a Tory are where their vote never counts or vice vera so there is no democracy at all blah blah, so because they can't have Corbyn we should hand away all our power as a people.

I actually find it quite incredible that anyone is considering handing power over them to the EU. Quite incredible - for what? For nothing - because sovereignty is priceless.

When Boris was appointed to lead the Brexit campaign my first thought was: is this a set-up?

Let's be quite clear - Boris has NOT been appointed to lead the LEAVE campaign at all. The official VOTE LEAVE campaign does not have a political leader. It is the mainstream media that is determining to portray Boris as the LEAVE leader. There are plenty of very able politicians of Tory/Lab/LibDem and Green party politics whose LEAVE voices are drowned out by the media scrum surrounding Boris.

Personally I'll be voting leave though I expect to be in a minority. I think it is the only way that the EU will be pushed toward desperately needed reform. Here is a list of the countries who are net contributors to the EU (those with a minus against them) and those who are not, english.eu.dk/en/faq/faq/net_contribution actually compiled by Denmark, but accurate as far as I know.

Why on earth should the UK with all its problems, support the other countries according to a process we can't control? I'm all in favour of support to other countries who need it, but if we pay then we assess how much and who to.

The EU has mishandled the Greek affair so badly it is unbelievable. The next stage will have to be consols by any other name. By failing to get to grips with that, the EU just prolongs the disgraceful financial and humanitarian crisis in Greece.

FWIW I don't blame the Greeks. If someone offers you free money with no monitoring and no output controls, of course you'd take it, that is human nature, BUT a halfway decent system would never have allowed that position to occur in the first place.

Also, the reality is that the principle of free movement of individuals assumes all countries are equally attractive so immigration will be fairly evenly distributed. They are not. Our culture, our language, our free health and education, our comprehensive welfare benefits and the National Living Wage make us probably the most attractive country in Europe for economic migrants. I don't see a vast inflow into Romania. That is just common sense.

I have taught in Inner London schools. The NORM is to have no children in the class whose parents were born in the UK. Some were children of refugees (Kurds and former Yugoslavs mainly), most are children of economic migrants who came via the EU.

Historians will look back on our inability to get a grip with bemusement.

Great post Absinthe.

Oh that sovreignty rant is a bit wierd tbh, if you are campaigning for the exit camp I think you'll put off a number of voters.

The totalitarian comparison isn't accurate at all, the Poles have lived through it, as have the Romanians, East Germans, Latvians, Lithuanians etc, I'm sure they don't see the EU like that.

In fact, I've just asked a Pole if the EU can be compared to the Dictatorships of Polish communism and there response by text was: "Don't be ridiculous."

I have even been told by a Pole that we should LEAVE because of the effect it is having in her home country, where the old are worried about losing so many of their young, able educated citizens

This is not surprising at all.

Just because one is Polish and an immigrant doesn't mean suddenly mass immigration makes sense. I have Polish relative who thinks our governments are bonkers. Like the rest of us, they have to use services as well.

Oh that sovreignty rant is a bit wierd tbh, if you are campaigning for the exit camp I think you'll put off a number of voters.

Typical REMAIN response to an inconvenient explanation of how the British Constitution works. You really don't want people to understand what they are about to give away do you?

The totalitarian comparison isn't accurate at all, the Poles have lived through it, as have the Romanians, East Germans, Latvians, Lithuanians etc, I'm sure they don't see the EU like that.

I was describing the views of an Iranian - not the eastern Europeans you are speaking about above - don't conflate. The Eastern Europeans see the EU as protection against hostile neighbours.

In fact, I've just asked a Pole if the EU can be compared to the Dictatorships of Polish communism and there response by text was: "Don't be ridiculous."

My Pole v your Pole. How pathetic.

Your posting style is very familiar.

To be fair, The former Eastern Bloc countries are reticent about migration to their lands aren't they. They have not experienced general immigration
( normal pre Blair immigration_) like the rest of Europe. They are not used to it and I believe it is they who are putting up a fierce protest against Refugees moving to their lands. There is little pull for the rest of the EU to want to move there. So I can imagine how some would view the whole situation from a different point of view.

Unless you have lived under those regimes its hard to imagine what it was like. I have seen the scars bourne out in my relative though.

You really don't want people to understand what they are about to give away do you?

I dont think this poster understands that themselves.

I don't know about the refugee situation, although Polish people I work with tell me that there are over a million Ukrainians who have come into Poland since the war there started.

That was a rather agressive post from the last one, I do think your sovriegnty rant was a bit odd, sorry, if you had stopped me in the street and that had been your gambit then I'd have been put off, and I'm the type of person who speaks to canvassers in the street!

In no way would I want people to be underinformed about anything to do with this debate so I don't know where that accusation came from? Its rather confrontational.

That was a rather agressive post from the last one, I do think your sovriegnty rant was a bit odd, sorry, if you had stopped me in the street and that had been your gambit then I'd have been put off, and I'm the type of person who speaks to canvassers in the street!

You were the one who called my explanation of Constitutional democracy a rant. That is pretty aggressive description .

In no way would I want people to be underinformed about anything to do with this debate so I don't know where that accusation came from? Its rather confrontational.

You're not even consistent. If I explain a constitutional democracy it is a rant however you would not wish anyone to be deprived of -- my rant. That's pretty controversial too.

Then again, if you don't understand the value of sovereignty and self-determination it's easy to naively dismiss it as a rant.