We cannot continue taking on immigrants indefinitely

[MobilityCat]

I'll probably be shot down for saying this but Immigration should be strictly controlled or we'll all become significantly disadvantaged. While international law doesn't require asylum seekers to stay in the first safe country they reach, some governments argue they should. There is a belief that the UK has a fairer asylum process, more legal protections, and better opportunities for work and education compared to other countries. While the reality may be different, word of mouth and social media often spread the idea that the UK is a good place to seek asylum. Our reputation as a desirable asylum destination is straining social services, housing, and the asylum system. The NHS and schools face increased pressure, housing shortages worsen, and asylum backlogs lead to long waits and high costs. Public frustration is growing, fueling political divisions. The system is unsustainable due to financial burdens, fairness concerns, and security risks.

There are very similar articles in the Observer and Independent. Labour are right to be worried. They cannot Ming vase this issue any longer. It is the rate of legal immigration which is the issue. All this focus on asylum seekers, which is a tiny number compared to our legal rates, was a bit of panto invented by the Conservatives with their Rwanda solution.

They are finished. But Labour don't have nearly as long.

The real problem is that British people refuse to take jobs in the NHS, social care, hospitality etc. We need to understand why this is the case. Is it because they are better off on benefits and free multi generational council housing? If we solve this problem we can start moderating immigration. If we can't, we have no choice but to accept it.

That's not the only problem - there simply aren't enough workers in this country paying tax to be able to pay for the most expensive demographic, the retired. Aside from the fact that they cost more than any other demographic in health and support services, the current generation of workers pay for their pensions.

Since the birth rate has been so low for so long, there's a massive population gap...and it's getting bigger, because the birth rate is still dropping (it's just over half what it was in the 1960s). The good news is that it'll even out in about 25 years.

The bad news is that, while those folk are still around, we either need immigrants to pay the tax for those people or we all need to be paying about £5-10k/year more tax each.

I think the issue of the NHS is simpler. The working conditions and pay rates created by the Conservatives made the jobs unattractive. They really did break it. These are things you can fix. The NHS is nominally full of good, secure jobs with good benefits attached. You need to look at contractors.

Social care is another matter. That looks unsolvable unless the pay rates went up and up. Nobody wants to pay for social care. I had two families next door to me in one house who had come from Sri Lanka to work in social care.

They brought their families with them which is course what I would have done in their shoes, children to educate and access to the UK school system. They were living in overcrowded conditions from the moment they arrived, the only way they could afford the house, and the British landlord was throughly exploitative by charging them a huge amount for the house.

The only person who did well out of this was the landlord, who, as soon as they asked for some repairs chucked them out.

I don't doubt they worked hard, but they lived in a way that most British people would not accept and for good reason. We have to stop this happening in the UK.

You say the pay is unattractive in the NHS and social care but the jobs are being done, just not by British workers, instead we have immigrants doing these jobs because British workers refuse to do them. There are still lots of vacancies in the NHS but, again not being filled by British people.

Where do Asylum seekers live? Not in houses? Houses that could be lived in by somebody else?

There was an argument once that immigration is good for the economy. That’s no longer the case because immigrants now on average use more in public services than they contribute in taxes, which is lowering GDP per capita.

It is now a fact that immigration is making the country poorer.

Do you have a reference for that? The OBR reckoned they're net contributors in their 5-year forecast, at least this time last year:

obr.uk/box/the-impact-of-migration-on-the-fiscal-forecast/

I'm not disagreeing with your post, but I do think the way we talk about working immigrants 'bringing their families with them' is disparaging. Has anyone in your family ever taken a job abroad, perhaps just for a few years, and not taken their family with them (assuming they were in a partnership with children)?

My grandfather certainly did when he went to Canada to work. His father did when he moved to England from Ireland for work. My father considered it when he was offered a job in Beirut many years ago, and my cousin has done so recently when she moved to Bangkok.

Why is it different?

Even if it is good, there is more to life than just GDP. We need to look at the impact on society.

Where is this referenced. The figures are not simple at all. But none of the peer reviewed credible reports that I have seen have concluded this

The impact is below 1% net contribution to GDP. For that increase I agree that the impact on society just isn’t worth it.

We need to look at raising these poorly paid jobs higher so that British people will do them. Pretty much everyone can be bought.

Labour have realised that a gigantic benefits bill and endless immigration is not the answer.

The squeeze on housing isn’t going away while we continue to bring a million people in a year.

This for instance isn’t included in GDP.

Under 1% net gain to the economy while NHS, housing, public infrastructure strained to breaking point.

Labour needs to get long term unemployment back into work and reduce immigration and this would solve some other problems that GDP figures simply don’t account for.

@Hazel665 - I wouldn't say it was unusual. The UK education system is very good, so I would have jumped at the chance if the shoe was on the other foot.

If you bring a lot of very low paid workers in with extensive families then the actual argument about economic contribution which is always made to support immigration disappears quite quickly.

Presumably the jobs you discuss in your post were quite well remunerated. These visas that would have been granted would be for well paid professionals jobs where the tax paid would have made such an arrangement worth it.

If you are really going to make an economic argument about migration you want a single migrant with no dependents on a short term visa. Migration is always justified in the UK on the basis of economics. If you give visas to people on very low wages with dependents then it's not economic.

And yet Reform are top of the polls? Weird.

As others have said, declining birthrate, 1.44 in 2023, is the main threat. The ageing and shrinking population is a perfect storm making state provisions unsustainable, particularly pensions and the NHS.

Immigration isn't making these problems worse, immigrants are predominantly young and productive, they aren't to blame, even if some politicians benefit from making them scapegoats.

Have you read any of the thread or the examples of Japan posted here?

It's not true that immigrants are doing 'all the jobs' in the NHS. British citizens make up the workforce in the same proportion as they constitute the population.

Immigrants also made demands on the NHS.

No, but I've visited many times for work, and understand the cultural and economic differences that make Japanese social provision very different to here.

Please link or quote anything you think I should read

Nonsense, the NHS would collapse without the immigrants that work there.

www.theguardian.com/society/2024/feb/12/record-one-in-five-nhs-staff-in-england-are-non-uk-nationals-figures-show

Yes, and one in five of the population are immigrants,

@FairCat Please go back and read the thread. Irritating when I have to repeat myself for those that turned up late and can’t be bothered to read. I’m not reposting links.

@1457bloom The NHS is really suffering right now for a variety of reasons and you’re behind the curve:

https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/am_i_being_unreasonable/5267503-aibu-to-be-furious-that-there-are-no-jobs-for-young-doctors?page=1

Both of you, why is Labour considering reinstating the the RMLT?

https://www.fsp-law.com/return-of-the-resident-labour-market-test/

Could it be we’ve got a giant benefits bill allowing millions to sit at home, while we import immigrants who don’t necessarily add anything to the bottom line but simply strain further already collapsing infrastructure?

https://www.fsp-law.com/return-of-the-resident-labour-market-test/

Go back and read the thread you might learn something instead of these little sound bites you’ve picked up from somewhere.

If any of this was true, that we cant survive without immigration, then one year of recent immigration at 1.4 million should have been enough to fill every vacancy in the country, and allow for some dependents too.

So why hasn’t it?

Because immigrants are people who also need all the things British people do. So we then need more people to service the demands immigrants make, and so it goes on.

I'm not sure why you're still talking about the housing crisis as if immigration is something to do with it... The problem has never been that we don't have enough homes for everyone in the country - we absolutely do. It is essentially an affordability crisis due to the massive lists of factors I listed above.

Less than 1% added to GDP

https://migrationobservatory.ox.ac.uk/resources/briefings/the-fiscal-impact-of-immigration-in-the-uk/#

takes no account of additional strain to housing, water, public transport, nhs and education, even national grid can’t keep up with demand and on its last legs.

GDP does not measure everything. IMHO, not worth it