To agree with Andy Burnham that it’s about time the middle classes took their fair share

[Morningteacup2]

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2026/08/11/burnham-middle-class-areas-must-take-more-hotel-migrants/

Not a huge fan of Labour I must say, but this is well overdue!

If he is going to move people to nicer more expensive areas where there are jobs typically, then surely it should be poorer people who are British or have a legal right to work here, so they benefit directly and wider society too. Why would a PM spend more taxpayer funds housing immigrants without legal status in more expensive areas, costing us all more.

Who's paying your pension?

Apparently, and they're all doctors and teachers and nurses as well usually.

London houses about a third of the hotel asylum seekers and Islington has its proportion of that

i’m not sure this is the gotcha he thinks it is tbh

I'm not sure it’s a very good solution - rather than reduce the pain we’ll just spread it around

“have you every called a working class person racist for complaining about the effects of mass immigration on their community?”

Yep. It will be good for all the champagne socialists and bleeding heart liberals who demean the working classes as ‘thick gammon brexiters’ and ‘racist bigots’ to maybe see a bit of the lovely and enhancing side of mass immigration in their leafy enclaves. Because when it’s all in shithole poverty-stricken towns like mine, it’s all very well. Let’s see them embrace it.

On a slightly related tangent it's odd how many people on Mumsnet are simultaneously hardworking home owners in expensive areas who would be punished cruelly by inheritance tax, mansion tax or wealth taxes AND also opposed to immigration because they live in working class areas that have been affected by asylum seekers in ways the champagne quaffing middle classes could never understand.

You see this is why my demographics indicator system is needed. We would be able to see if these are indeed the same people or two different groups. However I would point out there are some of us who are both wealthy home owners worried about tax etc etc and also totally aware of the effects of mass immigration in less affluent areas, opposed to mass immigration and conscious that the confinement of the associated problems to certain areas will not last. You don’t have to live in an inner city to be aware of and sympathetic to the effects people have been demonised for complaining about for years. .

What is the "something" that should be done though. Personally I draw the line at sinking boats and drowning people. Apart from that the options are:

• processing claims faster
• operating a one in one out agreement with France that enable us to quickly return those with failed claims
• sending failed claimants back to their countries faster (this meshes with point one)
• getting France to stop the boats from leaving by policing their shores
• "smashing the gangs" or trying to crack down on the criminal networks responsible for people snuggling. That requires sophisticated international cooperation
• international cooperation to eg stop the dingies used to cross the channel being sold
• open up more legal routes to claim asylum so people don't have to take dangerous routes run by crininals

The really big one is to go back in time and not do Brexit but that's not realistic. The other options are the only ones likely to work but (except for the last one) they have all been Labour policies that the "anti-migration" people have criticised non-stop. I was sceptical that "smashing the gangs" would actually work except that irregular migration, particularly small boat crossings, are down considerably this year, despite the weather being perfect for crossing. Plus there has been a change of behaviour (more people in single boats) which suggests the crackdown is hurting the gangs operations.

The mistake you are making is assuming that the people that don't like calls to drown migrants, or the riots outside hotels actually really want lots of people crossing on boats. Very few people want this. However the actual solutions.that have been proven to make a difference don't count apparently because it doesn't involve being angry so...

Oh my word. One of the main causes of the low birth rate of our population is house prices. House prices have been driven up by immigration. Basic supply and demand. Compare a graph of immigration to a graph of house prices if you don’t believe me. The answer is really not to just keep importing more and more Africans.

YABU. We should be reducing the number of migrants, not squabbling about who gets landed with them!

Why the middle-class ?
Buck House & Windsor Castle could house 100s.

I just don’t know how this works in practice: we live in the south, in an affluent leafy suburb. I doubt any house round here goes for less than £1.5. So is the government seriously going to spend £1.5 to house 3 young men in a big house with a huge garden? Can you imagine the public reaction? Obviously it makes more financial sense for them to be in cheaper areas.

Spite and envy
Which is a terrible way to run the country.
He needs to reinstate the tory Bill that banned anyone coming by boat from claiming asylum that starmer ditched and return every last one of them to france

Yes , all these champagne socialists in their 2mil houses can see the reality of their liberalism .

I actually thought that was what this was about

Are you not aware of how many young people in this country are struggling to find jobs???

I doubt they will.

Did he study JB Priestley at Cambridge?

Not some unemployed Somalian living in an ex-barracks somewhere, I can assure you.

How have they been demonised?

We had a right wing government in place for 14 years who regularly used the threat of migration/Labour being soft on migration as a scare tactic to encourage people to vote Tory. All the way allowing record amounts of migration and allowing a massive backlog of asylum applications to build up. You also had the likes of Jenrick making a big song and dance about painting over murals for children because it should be as unpleasant as possible

In addition to this you had parties like Reform being given disproportionately large platforms and they talk non stop about migration, Brexit having lost it's sheen.

Are there far left people on the internet who want open borders? Probably, but they are in the minority. The majority of people don't want open borders but also don't want to drown people, and understand that performative cruelty (painting over murals) isn't actually going to solve anything. The people most criticised are people setting fire to hotels, and biting policewomen in the face. Because those people are wankers. As are people that call for boats to be sunk by the navy. I wouldn't go so far as to call them demons. But it's not a workable or reasonable position. Sorry if that offends you.

I live in a middle class area we took our share, as have lots of others middle class areas

What a great idea. White working-class boys are an under-achieving demographic. Maybe seeing something to aspire to would give some of them a better chance in life.

Not sure where he gets the idea the middle class don’t have immigrants in their communities. London is full of the middle class and full of immigrants. I’m in a naice leafy suburb and a hotel of asylum seekers down the road. It would be more accurate to say rural areas where there’s no jobs or infrastructure have less immigrants.

The Labour Party are just tinkering round the edges. There's a massive pull factor and the migrants will keep coming unless they're deported or sent to a third country for processing. I have zero hope that Andy Burnham will do this.
Also even legal migration should have a cap on numbers coming to the country. I have a sneaking feeling that a lot of them are waved through as it's keys paperwork apparently.

I’m hearing and reading we have 1.5 million young British nationals with no jobs. My son is one. He has a bucket of GCSE’s and A levels. He has 5 mates in the same situation.At this point they would do literally any job. I really think we don’t need 250 fellas on a fuck off dinghy filling the need gap.

I live in a very MC area and we have a hotel full of asylum seekers a 10 minute walk down the road. AFAIK they’ve never been a problem - I’ve yet to hear any complaints.