Ms. Birchill, a lady I would hesitate, nay, tremble, to take on in an argument pulls on her 'bovver boots' (I bet she wore them back in her day) and gives those oh-so superior, Lefty, metropolitan prats who lord it over us 'untermenschen' a hefty kick where it hurts! She quotes the results of a poll by the 'YouGov-Cambridge Globalism survey' which showed that we Brits are more open and agreeable to immigration than any other European country except Poland.
Only 37 per cent of us Britons [my emphasis] are of the opinion that the cons outweigh the pros – less than any other people except the Poles. We showed the highest level of support of any country for qualified professionals coming to the UK with a job offer, with 80 per cent agreeing they were good for the country. In a further trouncing of the knee-jerk “gammon” stereotype, more British men than women are in favour of immigration.
It will come as a shock to all those Brit-hating liberal, Euro fanatics who insist that the 'plebs' are a bunch of proto-fascists who hate all foreigners.
George Orwell had these types bang to rights: “It is a strange fact, but it is unquestionably true that almost any English intellectual would feel more ashamed of standing to attention during God Save the King than of stealing from a poor-box.”
The simple truth is that you do NOT have to be a foreigner-hating bigot just because you value the many good things achieved by your own country.
When people of "talent" and those who are prepared to work hard want to migrate to a country and want to contribute to that country in a positive way then that country is obviously doing something right.
The opinions of "Lefty metropolitan prats" are largely irrelevant.
Posted by: AussieD | Monday, 06 May 2019 at 11:04
Her headline asks about an "emotional need" of liberal snobs. Liberals are governed by emotion as if it was a dietary staple. Proper standing among their peer group trumps(sorry)all.
Posted by: Whitewall | Monday, 06 May 2019 at 12:04
If racism was normal then the word would be a compliment. It isn't a compliment because racism is rare.
Not so sure how welcoming the Poles are though.
Posted by: Pat | Monday, 06 May 2019 at 13:28
Well. I'll be damned.
Apologies David for my previous mockery of your country's speech laws being so much harsher than my country's speech laws.
Were a poll to come out and say, "We showed the highest level of support of any country for qualified professionals coming to the UK with a job offer." The pollsters would immediately come under fire for being racists. And worse.
And probably lose their government issued license for future polls.
For sure they'd be making no appearances on The View.
Posted by: JK | Monday, 06 May 2019 at 14:37
Selecting only qualified professionals as immigrants for Blighty has three faults: -
1. The assumption that the state knows best which workers should come to this country.
Demand for qualified professionals vs unskilled workers fluctuates when the borders are open. The market decides whether Blighty is overstocked with white or blue colour workers. In the 1970's it was overstocked with white colour workers but the US was short, so we had the "brain drain" from Blighty to the US. In the 1980's it was the opposite, so we had the "Auf Wiedersehen, Pet" generation of construction workers who went to Germany for work. And in the 2000's Blighty was short on unskilled workers with a solid work ethic, so Eastern European workers filled the gap.
The state can't run a flippin' whelk-stall, as pointed out frequently by me and others on this blog. Why on earth would you think that it could somehow out-perform the decision making of billions of employees and millions of employers in a global neural network of cost and benefit calculations?!
I mean, are you off your rockers?
2. It's Classist.
Yes, Classist. That -ist and -ism that at its worst put 120 million souls of MY CLASS into an early grave in the 20th century. No other discrimination in history comes close to its barbarity and evil ...
https://duffandnonsense.typepad.com/duff_nonsense/2006/05/a_belated_happy.html
Why should one class of society be persecuted with global competition when the others are protected? What kind of equal society under the law is that? How is that not arbitrary power exerted by the executive against a minority?
Didn't those bad behaviours by the state and poor outcomes for individuals and "society" get roundly trashed by logic and reason in the Age of Enlightenment? Why the encore?
3. It's inconsistent with free trade.
If unskilled workers are to be protected in the service industries of Blighty against immigrant competition, why not in the product manufacturing industries also? Why not call a halt to free trade in products to protect domestic manufacturing industry?
Again, why the arbitrary favouritism towards service sector workers and against manufacturing workers? I can go out and buy a dirt cheap washing machine made in Taiwan that wiped out the washing machine industry and all the manufacturing jobs associated therewith in Blighty, but when I want a plumber to deliver and fit it I'm shafted by local workers only restriction?
So in proposing selective immigration you've just denied free trade also if you are to be consistent.
Selective immigration is protectionism, which you Dad's Army, Brexiteer, Country-Bumpkin types apparently abhor because you're into free trade, but also adore when it's applied to services. So you look inconsistent and silly.
SoD
Posted by: Loz | Monday, 06 May 2019 at 20:55