OK - Britain is a small country

[friskyfox]

So why are we taking in more immigrants? We now have an influx of Romanians and Bulgarians coming here. Before anyone calls me racist or the like, I am 100% not. It just annoys me because we are a tiny country. Why are countries like Australia, NZ, USA, and Canada more selective and Britain is not.
thelink

I find the DM horribly xenophobic. I wouldn't begrudge anyone who comes here to work hard and make a better life. Likewise, I wouldn't begrudge giving santuary to a family fleeing war etc i.e. a genuine refugee.

I do have a problems with Brits who choose benefit dependancy as a lifestyle though, who can work but won't. People who come here to work from over seas must be dumbfounded by a systrem that has supported, in many cases, several generations of families where no adult works!!! There are many aspects of the system which encourage this e.g. the cost of child care and housing means a lot of people would be worse off if they work than if they claim, so who can blame them?

ballbaby - thats a good point. imo its because germany is a community, run by the people for the people. (approximately) Seriously, it is more democratic than the uk, which is run by the rich for the rich, and the rest of us are just peasants who exist to work for them and drown our cares in the pub on friday nights, and spend 2 weeks a year on the costa del sol.

Germans take their duty to be good citizens seriously, and as a result, they provide and get far better standards than we do. They are more conscientious about their work (moaning about the fatcat directors round the coffee machine is a british habit). They are super clean and tidy. They recycle things and use trains and their children walk to school, because its the right thing to do. This community spirit, and insistence upon everyone having the right to give their opinion, also leads to bureaucratic nightmare, btw.
But I still cant face coming home to uk to live permanently in an episode of the Simpsons, and spend my life admiring beautiful scenery that I cant afford to own a piece of.

I feel sorry for the migrant workers who come here thinking they can save up some money with better wages so they can return home and buy a house (the reason a lovely Polish couple told us) or whatever. It is so expensive and they are being exploited by everyone for simply having a great work ethic.

Employers here do not want to have the lazy long-term unemployed that have no inclination ever to work as benefits are really too generous now. And I hate saying that because I know people who are long-term unemployed not through choice and are looking forward to the new schemes and I know people (who have usually worked at some point) who get benefits that wouldn't keep a small hamster in food! Yet there are so many, and I live in a town where it is the majority, who leave school, sign on and that is it.

No ambition, no desire to...how should I say this, buy something with the money they earned rather than handouts.

So if employers rush to give jobs to hard working (and they really are) Polish etc. then who can blame them? As long as they are paid a decent wage, and as long as they are not expecting councils to house them (though I would rather live next to them than the shiftless buggers that live round here! So am flexible on that rule!)

look, benefits really arent generous. Its very difficult to live long term on them, unless you are fiddling somehow.

Are there really many families of several unemployed generations any more? am genuinely curious, as I have never met one, despite living in an unemployment blackspot a few yrs ago.

I love these type of arguements. I may be wrong but I am sure I read somewhere that in fact MORE briatins left the UK than immigrants came. So what does that mean. a fall in population.

Secondly if the general population is getting older, haveing less babies etc then less people are in fact working and paying taxes, which means less money for essential services, perhaps we could solve this pay importing thousands of people to work here, pay taxes and contribute to society!! Oh no that would be wrong as they are not british and therefore they cannot actually be seen to be contributing to society, merely adding to it's ills.

And of course all these immigrants, economic or whatever are actullay rapist/massmurderers, scroungers etc etc, far far more than home grown brits are.

Lastly Frisky - HOW VERY DARE YOU suggest you are thinking of emigrating, in your own words this shouldn't be allowed (and in any case who the hell would want you) Oh unless of course you got ot teh Costas or whereever which is populated by people like you who bitch and moan about how awful immigration in the UK is whilst they sit back, daily mail in one habd, sangria in the other and contributing JACK SHIT to the spainish economy (or is that ok, since they are british )

i think the world would be better if we could just come and go where and when we wanted.

My job is partly overseeing employment programmes - mainly on housing estates in the south east. There are certainly families where the parents and grandparents have lived most, if not all, of their working life on benefits. Its difficult for people to come off benefits if they would be worse off working though. e.g,. the cost of child care is an arm and a leg, so is housing etc.

A lot of migrant workers live in appalling housing conditions and if they lived in the kind of housing we expect, they wouldn't be able to afford to work for such low wages.

I know several cleaners etc employed by friends who work all hours of the day and send money to their families back home. They weren't able to spend Christmas with their children as they couldn't afford the fares back. A miserable existance by all accounts, which enables us to benefit from their cheap labour

the reason i am thinking of emigrating is because this country is in such a bad way. Not because there are thousand of immigrants arriving all the time.

Shouldn't be allowed is all I say

If you don't want people here, hopefully nowhere will want you.

the world is just a great big onion...

Aloha has pretty much already answered the question with the point I'd have made...

and many people from the UK are reaping plenty of rewards from new countries being admitted to the EU - 'investing' in cheap property as has already been pointed out, bumping up the prices nicely for the 'impoverished' and moving businesses out there (as did the company I previously worked for) to take advantage of cheap land, building & labour. It works both ways, and usually, whatever bitterness the DM tries to stir up, to the richer country's advantage.

WhatwouldJesusdo, you should visit the town where I live, in fact I would imagine in most ex-mining towns, there are now third generation unemployed.

They all know how to work the system which is why they can cream off more than they deserve. One of my esteemed neighbours offered another a job where he worked, the answer "I canny be arsed working, I'm fine as I am." This man has 3 children, a home, doesn't pay for anything yet has more than us idiots who do work. Either he or his wife should be working as it only needs one person at home with the children, actually looking after them of course, not sitting reading the Sun flicking cigarettes into the garden. Ahem, 'scuse me back to the point.

And that is not an isolated case. I used to think living on benefits must be so hard until I moved here and into a housing association house. I have been on benefits once, when I was between jobs, and I know I received hardly any money (and mine went into finding another job, bus fares etc. as well as living expenses.) I took a badly paid job just to come off the benefits, yet if I had gone straight to benefits from school, and this seems to be the idea of long-term unemployed now, I would have gotten more.

It is crazy.

Also notable, in the town next to mine, there are two blocks of council flats, one is occupied by the merry jobless, the other by Polish migrants. Guess which block is sparkly clean, well kept and which is a complete toilet.

Why they want to come here God only knows!

How very annoying, tibts. When we were on benefits, we just managed to pay our bills and afford 2 luxuries, which were a car, and 10pounds a week childcare in the subsidised nursery at the college where I was studying. I dont see how anyone could afford more than a car and around 3 packs of ciggies a week, if they genuinely are living on benefits. Our food bills were cut to the bone (shop for dinner with 1 pound, anyone?)

Other people were better off, either because they were defrauding, usually by not declaring that they were living together or because they got casual work from time to time.

After I got a job, we did go through a period of about 2 years when we would have been better off on benefits, plus all the stress of working. We only stuck it because my salary was rising so fast. If Id hadnt had those prospects, I dont think I would have wanted to come off benefits either.

You are also better off on benefits if you have more kids, thereby creating more people who will grow uphave a deep down moral belief that it's ok not to contribute in any positive way to society. I'm going to be extremely controversial and suggest that might the one of the answers (in the long term) be to offer women on benefits more weekly cash to have the (reversible) pill injection?

I'm waiting for the backlash

Ballbaby - that's naughty!! LOL

In the US and Australia, the governments used to forcebly give the indigenous women Depo Prevera to stop them reproducing as they didn't think they were fit mothers .

I work full time and DH works 6 days a week and we are completely broke due to childcare and mortgage fees

Living in London as we do, there is really no excuse for people not to work if they are able bodied as there is no unemployment here. But the system is such that it encourgages people to exploit it.

To come off benefits you need to go direct into a well paid job in order to pay for childcare, fares, work clothes etc. The government has lots of "schemes" to get people into jobs (specially lone parents) but refuses to subsidies universal affordable childcare like other countries do. We pay £12,000 a year for childcare - that is for an average priced childminder for a 3 year old and school runs for the 6 year old ; not for some trendy Montessori nursery or anything.

I remember when I was a student, in the good old days when students could sign on during the holidays , - queuing up to sign on and the queues being full of blokes in blue overalls (i.e. builders) waiting to sign on LOL!!

There is little incentive for people to come off benefits IMHO. Apart from pride of course.....

I certainly don't think anyone should be forced to do anything - I'm not that bad - but think an incentive might help improve the awful society we seem to be creating where we need migrants because there are so many people we need to support who don't want to work.

The Finnish man I was talking to at a confernce living in London now...... their friend was complaining about childcare going up to £1200 a year(!) for the nursery place and he and his wife who works full time were contrasting that with London prices for childcare. Do we want to pay Finnish and French taxes is the only question I suppose - only female higher rate tax payers with children allowed to answer that question by the way.

That is quite a logical leap, that people on benefits bring their children up to believe that its ok not to contribute to society.
I dont think that most single parents on benefits(who have no other choice probably) bring their children up with this view.

I've always thought we should have more workfare - you only get the benefits if you work or actually I'd prefer giving everyone over 18 in the UK £100 or £200 a week whether they work or not including pensioners so you just abolish the whole stupid complex benefits system entirely.

xenia - in germany, single people pay out arount 50% of their income in taxes. Married people with 4 children, get to hold on to around 80% of their income. Private schools seem to get a huge subsidy, as they are much cheaper than in uk. So the answer to your question is - yes. Im already there.

I already pay 40% of my pay in taxes, plus huge council tax, childcare, ever rising energy bills, mortgage etc.

I do think that for the amount of tax I pay I should get some bloody help with the childcare costs.

Less money on war, more on childcare, that's what I would do

So if we introduced free universal under 5s childcare provision I wonder how many stay at home mothers and fathers there would be or if it would not really affect the figures?

If you put me in charge I'd soon be able to cut back enough in all kinds of areas to afford that. It would be terribly good for women in society to so a moral good. Blair offerred universal half days I think for 4 year olds which is why my sister and I got money off our children's private schools fees for that year so the principle is already established.

Governmetn provided that kind of help when it was needed - state nurseries during WWII because they needed women in the munitions factories - soon turfed us back into the kitchen though when they wanted to force us to hand jobs back to men afterwards.

Perhaps those on benefits could have as their work fare for their benefits 10 hour working days helping out in well run free childcare arrangements.

OK - I'm reading this. with a hangover, so here goes:
there is a cycle of benefits dependance. My family were a classic example : but in any other area it would be called laziness. Because it is.

if I ruled the world I would insist that anyone getting benefits actually DID something, no matter how little to earn the money they get. Those physically able would do manual work like cleaning grafitti, picking up litter, those less able would do other things such as visiting old people, reading to the blind etc - anything where they can see a tangible result.
It's the only way they will learn that working equates with value, and have some pride in doing something. Unemployment would be much lower and everyone would benefit.

My ds is a single mum, working only enough hours to ensure her benefits are not affected, she has MUCH more disposable income than the rest of my family who work, pay for childcare, pay a mortgage, council tax etc. This cannot be right.

Tuppance spent!

i've got a hangover from hell and wont be able to articulate how I feel about this but you can run and jump if you think that i'll be picking up litter or looking after anyone elses kids for my £57 a week income support!

Don't you think it keeps people (and their offspring) down to pay them benefits for doing nothing? Is it not doing them a favour to incentivise them to work and make something of themselves?

I am generalising - not commenting on your particular circumstances of which I know nothing.