So explain to me how you & I benefit from the rise in immigration

[contentiouscat]

Please explain to me who except the already rich employers (and translators) are benefitting - im not trying to be contentious I would just like to understand.

They are cheap labour therefore why should a british employer pay a decent wage i.e enough for you and I to pay our mortgage when they can get an immigrant willing to live 20 to a house in substandard conditions. So wages will go down.

They dont pay much tax because they are on minimum wage plus are sending a lot of their wages out of the country.

They are entitled to healthcare and as this report says are costing the police money.
news.uk.msn.com/Article.aspx?cp-documentid=6167846

I also read yesterday that european immigrants are entitled to tax credits for their children who still live abroad (wtf), hospitals, police, school have to employ translators - of course this is all coming out of the piggy bank you and I have paid into for years and will continue to.

I just dont get it - SORRY!

"Custy knows more about housing than you and I and said it is given out to those most needy. Any Brits at the back of the list are there cos they are less needy -not cos they are Brits. "

I never disputed that though I doubt the system is perfect. People do, understandably perhaps, feel resentful if, after paying high taxes all their lives in the UK, they are at the bottom of the list for scarce social housing after migrants who have just arrived.

There is a really interesting discussion to be had about this and I think that migrants are scapegoated here again. There is an urgent need for more social housing, given the insane expense of buying a place of your own and lack of regulation of the rental sector. The points system should be scrapped I think. It is seen as being unfair and creates all kinds of perverse incentives.

I agree that there is a need for more social housing. I don't know enough about the points system to comment on whether it should be changed.

Very good new film on channel 4 last night 'It's a Free World' by Ken Loach.

Some areas don't have a points system but band people A,B,C,or D,
www.locata.org/(S(t0cpy455zb5txpuohewuju45))/schemeguide2.aspx

In reality homes are usually only given to people in category A or B, in Ealing an area covered by locata there are often only 1000 properties allocated per year and the number of Homeless families is over 10000 per year. This scarcity of resources means that a disabled asian woman who's father ran the local shop and has contributed the UK economy but living with her elderly mother would be a band C and therefore will not likely get a home and she felt annoyed about an Albanian family who have never contributed being a higher priority. When her mother dies and the home is left to her sisters and brothers her equity will not be enough to buy a flat and she will be homeless making her a Band A.

So councils priortise on need, however, my experience is that a large proportion of immigrants have been allowed into this country through the Assylum system when actually they are economic migrants and the system has been heavily abused. The home office are trying to address this but the influx of EU migrants has compounded the problem further.

The point is that until the system is under control and we have enough resources for the people who are here, it is ridiclous to exacerbate the problems by accepting more migrants who are eligible for Housing.

One further point is that someone commented that often immigrants take housing that Bitish people don't want. Again in my experience I have had immigrants turn down perfectly good properties eg// "because they wanted to be nearer Kensington and Chelsea" (we all like that wouldn't we) so sweeping generalisations like that are completely unfounded and actually racist (since we like playing the race card on this thread).

As for more social housing, don't

Some areas don't have a points system but band people A,B,C,or D,
www.locata.org/(S(t0cpy455zb5txpuohewuju45))/schemeguide2.aspx

In reality homes are usually only given to people in category A or B, in Ealing an area covered by locata there are often only 1000 properties allocated per year and the number of Homeless families is over 10000 per year. This scarcity of resources means that a disabled asian woman who's father ran the local shop and has contributed the UK economy but living with her elderly mother would be a band C and therefore will not likely get a home and she felt annoyed about an Albanian family who have never contributed being a higher priority. When her mother dies and the home is left to her sisters and brothers her equity will not be enough to buy a flat and she will be homeless making her a Band A.

So councils priortise on need, however, my experience is that a large proportion of immigrants have been allowed into this country through the Assylum system when actually they are economic migrants and the system has been heavily abused. The home office are trying to address this but the influx of EU migrants has compounded the problem further.

The point is that until the system is under control and we have enough resources for the people who are here, it is ridiclous to exacerbate the problems by accepting more migrants who are eligible for Housing.

One further point is that someone commented that often immigrants take housing that Bitish people don't want. Again in my experience I have had immigrants turn down perfectly good properties eg// "because they wanted to be nearer Kensington and Chelsea" (we all like that wouldn't we) so sweeping generalisations like that are completely unfounded and actually racist (since we like playing the race card on this thread).

As for more social housing, don't

As for more social housing...

Areas with very high dense social housing often have high drugs and crime rates, high poverty rates and many people are caught in a poverty trap, they come heavily dependent on benefits and lack of occupational activity leads to poor health and things like depression. The second, third and subsequent generations then have never learnt to work ad the cycle continues.

Many people on the thread have said we have plenty of British people on benefits but fail to realise that by accepting very low skilled immigrants into this country, placing them in social housing, educating their children in a system that is stretched to the limit that they are locking in future generations into a life of crime, drugs and poverty aswell.

interesting points Difers but surely one can understand that a woman looking after her elderly mother, who at the moment has a home to live in, will not be as high priority as a family including children without a home at all, regardless of nationality?

My Dh is from the Balkans, and knows a bit more about Albanians and Kosovans than us, though he isn't one. He feels quite a few Albanians may have falsely claimed asylum as Kosovan Albanians, and it seems often their origin is not checked or is impossible to check. this is obviously a problem and the fault lies in a clueless and inadequate immigration service.
However, it would be difficult for an Eastern European of any other nationality to claim asylum.

there was a case publicized about a violent pimp who had falsely claimed asylum for many years, he was Albanian but had pretended to be Kosovan, but I have no idea how widepread that kind of pretence is.

"Backtobasics - you think that immigrants are less worthy of support regardless of their circumstances?"

No that is not what i said at all. I have no problem with immigrants getting help from the Uk if they have it bad where they are from. I don't think it is right through that a suffering immigrant family should be more priority over suffering English families. I know that probably is the pc thing to say, i think that as our family actually lived here all our lives and paid into the system, we should be more priority on the housing list.

I also see that you LadyLush seem to have it in for me on this thread because i called your answer stupid. I didn't say you were stupid i said what you said was stupid which it was. Saying 'shop else where' isn't the answer and i realise you have had good experiences with immigrants who barely speak English but alot of people on this thread haven't had such luck.

Isn't the pc thing to say!

I'm sorry but poverty doesn't = crime, if people got off their arses and went to work or failing that into community service then they would be too busy for crime.
There are too many people on benefits full stop, my grandmother was a widow and had 6 kids under 12 and worked three jobs, those were the days when claiming was something to be ashamed of not a fecking lifesytle choice.
As I said if immigrants make the scum in this country realise they will not be handed a house then they have done us all a favour.

No Ruty, the lady was disabled and her mother was looking after her, she was very elderly, they were both very aware that the situation would come to an end in the near future.

I gave this example because some people lower down the thread seem to think it is always white british people who complain about immigrants but I have had many migrants and second generation migrants say to me that the system is wrong at the present time.

Another example is that I had a very elderly man from Abyssinia say that he was at the end of his tether because he couldn't understand most of what his black africian carers were saying and that he couldn't understand why the UK allow anyone to be carers, regardless of whether they can speak English or have the skills to be carers. He had ran his own business and worked for many years.

So it's not just white people that are saying that immigration should be managed alot better and limits should be in place.

Can everyone (waaay back at the beginning of this thread) drop the 'cheap labour' stuff.

We own a small business and employ several Eastern Europeans. They enjoy exactly the same pay, rights and benefits as any 'natives.' The difference is that they actually turn up (on time) for the interview and don't spend the whole time telling a prospective employer "I won't/don't do X,Y or Z."

Three of our staff are saving to buy property back home in Poland/Czech Rep/Slovakia and these are twenty year old women! I was nowhere near as together as them at the same age.

From an employer's POV it is a breath of fresh air. They understand that a job contract is a two-way thing.

ie. You work. We pay you for it.

NOT

I work and although you pay me for it, I'm doing you a favour.

Spot on Bubble, I work for a company that employs drivers and the two Poles we have had have been fantastic, we had two "Brits" one a single man with three teenage children who basically told me he would only work 16 hours a week because otherwise he lost whatever we paid him in tax credits and other housing benefits etc, where was the mans sense of pride, of being self sufficent, oh no he had been in the benefits cycle for so long all he could see was what he would loose. not what he would gain, not the example he would set the children about contributing to society.
In the end he didn't turn up for a week, no phone call, no nothing and then kicked off because he'd been replaced (he was on a temporary contract) but he seriously expected we would keep the job open and made terrible racist comments and no doubt slated us to everyone he met and carried on the "it's so hard for single parents" spiel he gave me before we offered him a good opportunity to get back on his feet.

that is interesing Bubble99.
Difers, I understand the woman was disabled. I am just guessing that someone who has a roof over their head at the time of a claim against someone who has no home at all will not be the first priority.
My mother spent the last 2 years of her life in a care home. Most of the carers and nurses were recruited from Africa,and a few from the Phillipines. Many of them did not speak English. But they were mostly kind and caring. I have my own guesses as to why they were doing the job of caring for people in advanced stages of illness, Parkinsons and dementia, and not British people. I don't think British people on the whole would want to do it. there was only one qualified nurse per ward so the others were not that well pain. And they had to do quite a bit of personal care. I would love to see carers in that environment undergo better training and then have better pay. But that is the fault I presume of the system where care homes are privatized and run for maximum profit, even when the council pays the fees. That is not the fault of the immigrants. That is capitalism.

paid not pain!

Agreed Ruty.

"why should someone who has come here from another country for whatever reason get priority over a suffering family who are English?" Backtobasics - grammatically your statement was open to interpretation. No I don't have it in for you. Yes I was a bit irritated that my earlier sarcastic comment had been misconstrued as a naive, feckless one but I am so able to move on! In terms of our views we seem poles apart (pardon the pun!)on this thread but that does not make it personal by any means.

I haven't read the whole thread,but last week was talking to my friend,who is Filipina & has residency here.She was talking about her family & that she only gets to talk to them once a month,because of the cost of the phone calls ect.I asked if they were able to come & visit her & her family here & she told me what they had to go through to just visit the UK.I was completely shocked at the hoops they had to jump through,just for a trip to see family.I had no idea that the rules were so strict-the newspapers certainly don't make a song and dance about that.Most of themn would have you believe that anyone can waltz right on in.

same with any of my dh's family FG. They have to queue up at the embassy in their country, have a [rather humiliating from the stories they have told us] interview, have a letter of invitation from us detailing where they will stay, for how long, and who will be financially responsible for them while they are here. We have even had to provide evidence of how many rooms we have in our apartment. and even then they don't always get permission. It is not easy at all.

thank goodness for a bit of mix in the gene pool that's what i say.