At the very outset of the referendum campaign both Norman Lamb and Anna Soubry took part in a BBC Radio 4 Any Questions programme broadcast from Spalding. During that debate a North Lincolnshire farmer appearing on the panel alongside Kate Hoey for the leave side said he wanted free movement of labour to remain, because he would be unable to recruit workers without it. He also made positive remarks about the diverse nature of shops in the town. Both remarks resulted in audible boos from the audience, showing the strength of feeling in the hall. Frankly you would not have heard a stauncher defender of the EU than Anna and Norman that evening. Just what the Remain campaign was up against became very clear.
South Lincolnshire is a major horticultural area and has always been used to seasonal workers. Irish, Maltese, students, South Yorkshire miners, Portuguese and Spaniards have all worked here. A few remained the vast majority returned. Now we have Poles, Latvians, Lithuanians, Romanians and Bulgarians.
In the last 10 to 15 years the nature of the food industry has changed. There is an enhanced ability to store vegetables in chilled storage for longer and to transport exotic fruits and salads from around the world. It was a natural extension to the existing food preparation operations in the area for new ranges to be prepared locally making use of the existing food distribution networks. As the industry changed the demand for an all year round workforce with the flexibility to work in different factories increased.
These changes increased after 2001. The 2011 census shows that those who have come from countries that acceded to the European Union between 2001 and 2011 in Boston and South Holland make up 10.60% and 5.9% of the total population respectively.
By any benchmark, that is a rapid change and I have no doubt that the figures today are higher. This increase has resulted in increased pressures on already underfunded local services, which in itself would be a problem. Imagine that 8,000 people had moved here from London entirely unexpectedly for work in a few short years. I know what the locals would be saying – they’d be saying “These bloody Londoners taking up jobs, clogging up the doctors’ surgeries and hospitals”.
Why is it that substituting “Londoner” by “foreigner” it is then called racism or xenophobia? Is it not simply a reaction to an unplanned, unexpected rapid change?
As those who have moved to the area hail from overseas there are additional factors that come into play. There is a divide of language between “them” and “us”. Dig deeper and “them” consists of different sub-communities of diverse nationalities from a whole swathe of Eastern Europe from Latvia down to Bulgaria, yet we simply badge them as “Eastern Europeans” expecting them to be one large community.
There has been little effort to help these various nationalities understand what their rights and responsibilities are apart from poorly-supported voluntary organisations. This failing I believe has helped contribute towards some other drivers of the eurosceptic mentality.
• People hear foreign languages being spoken in the streets and wonder why there are not more efforts to encourage English learning. How would you feel if you are unable to understand what someone in a place of work or on the high street who is looking directly at you is saying? Some might call it paranoia. I prefer to call it curiosity or plain nosiness.
• How has the law as it stands resulted in multiple off licenses being established in very close proximity to each other? How can these businesses make money? Are they doing something dodgy? Are they in a trade war? Why do people still shop in minimarkets that have been awarded 1 in food hygiene standards? If the communities do not share a language how can they share information or gossip about such matters?
• Why does the system seemingly prevent the various criminal and civil law enforcement agencies sharing information that would enable those who abuse our hospitality and don’t play by the rules to be investigated and prosecuted – examples being the dodgy gangmaster who fiddles the system, exploits workers and undercuts those who try to play by the rules, or the minimarkets caught selling bootleg booze and fags aimed clearly at, and ripping off, Eastern European consumers, undercutting legitimate law-abiding businesses in the process?
• Finally, given that we had an independent district councilor go on BBC Countryfile to talk about street drinking during the Referendum campaign, I will touch on it. There is indeed an issue with daytime street drinking in parts of the town. This leaves a very visible trail that no one can do much about without getting Network Rail to close the railway line. This is probably one of the most visible drivers of Eurosceptism.
I have written about Spalding, but it could easily be Boston or Wisbech. These drivers of Eurosceptism have allowed UKIP to flourish locally. The peddlers of fear have won the argument. The basic human reaction to fear is a desire to pull up the drawbridge. Voices for positive action to address the changes that immigration has resulted in are now few and far between.
On 24th June we found that regardless of the promises of the Brexiters, the issues that face my town and others remain. The work of fixing them must soon begin. This can only be done by the open minded.
I will never give up on Europe, but living in an area where the “52%” are 70% in many parts, I believe it is imperative that as well as championing the 48%, pro EU campaigners find a way nationally to open closed minds amongst the 52%.
* John Bland lives and works in Spalding, Lincolnshire. Staunchly pro European, he joined the party following the 2015 General Election and is currently Secretary of the South Lincolnshire Liberal Democrats.
Follow @libdemvoice.org on Bluesky
Like us on Facebook
Subscribe to our feed
Sign-up for our daily email digest
Hilaire Belloc's persecution of Charles Masterman
Finding your moral compass
Live in the sky with Liverpool Labour's pie in the sky housing policy
Cheney Payne re-selected for Cambridge
Electoral register update
Unions and campaigners opposing ban on Palestine Action
Tim Rogers
David Le Grice
Tristan Ward
Jack Meredith
62 Comments
It is worth asking (because someone may have an answer) what process/data-gathering/organisational changes would be required so that local public services could respond effectively to “unexpected rapid change”?
Anyone who does not support the EU Commission, the Euro, Schengen, EU enlargement or TTIP is a protectionist little Englander
“Imagine that 8,000 people had moved here from London entirely unexpectedly for work in a few short years.”
We don’t have to imagine it, because it happened. Anyone remember the overspill towns of the 1950s and 1960s? Peterborough and Thetford were two such. It was government policy at the time to transplant Londoners into the East of England. Did it result in the growth of xenophobic politics? Not that I can remember.
On the issue of street drinking, I have observed this recently in Wisbech, and also in Worthing. Unlike British street-drinking, East European street-drinking is non-threatening, though many people may not realise this. I agree that it is unacceptable, but harangues from UKIP and Murdoch are not the way to deal with it.
Finally! Someone on this site who actually lives among the problems that uncontrolled free movement and the failure of our (yes, including OUR Coalition) Government to implement hard and soft policies to do anything other than take the tax money have created. If I lived in Boston, I’d probably have voted Leave in sheer frustration too.
http://www.electoral-reform.org.uk/better-referendum
Stimpson: “Anyone who does not support the EU Commission, the Euro, Schengen, EU enlargement or TTIP is a protectionist little Englander”. No. I am a pro-European and have been since I was a small child. I campaigned to Remain and we won in the Tunbridge Wells Counting Area. Neither Stronger In nor Liberal Democrats IN called anyone a “little Englander”. The UK previously had two commissioners, now one. I opposed the change at Lib Dem conference. The UK is not in the euro, John Major opted out and Blair-Brown did not opt in. The Schengen Area is widely misunderstood: the common format for passports issued by the UK was agreed by Mrs Thatcher and Lord Carrington and should continue to be machine-readable; police co-operation is essential and was agreed by Tory Home Secretary Michael Howard, now a peer; free movement of people on the continent was a reality long ago, I remember crossing from Belgium to France in a UK registered car before the UK was in the EEC, legally it only applies to citizens of member states; plenty of US citizens opposed TTIP (and TTP) neither of which has been finally negotiated, they are not Little Englanders.
Lib Dems are always exceedingly keen to open up other peoples *closed minds*, but rarely have anything of substance beyond that. Let’s talk money,.. because money is an excellent lubricant for shifting things that appear stuck.
How about scraping the Barnett Formula for a start.? Do you find it ironic, or coincidence, that the Leave ~ Remain vote level matches almost in lockstep with how much ( or little !), public money is allocated to the region.?
Am I right in thinking that Lib Dems (in 2011), put forward a pledge to scrap the Barnett Formula and replace it with a more needs based system.? What happened to that pledge.? Is it not worth re-pledging that fairer public funding system, in order to assist the opening,… of closed minds.?
J Dunn
Look at the tax take. Leave areas are already heavily subsidised by Remainers. Is that what ‘taking back control’ meant? Bigger handouts? Sorry, there isn’t going to be any money for that.
The basic it problem with immigration is tribalism and culture. People just do not mix that easily and the larger the various groupings get the less reason they have to mix.
John Bland – thank you for a very interesting article. I am impressed with your four bullet points which I have never seen made anywhere else.
Of course, as we all know, the Leave Vote won’t help fix any of the problems. Instead, a nationalist narrative has been allowed to gain traction. It projects everything bad (probably even the weather, when appropriate) onto the EU. I hope its appeal will weaken sooner rather than later, but it is necessary for us to be actively thinking of ways to fix what has gone wrong in our country in order to show our own good faith as pro-EU campaigners. You, for one, are trying to do this, so I wish you good luck.
Is Stimpson real ? It seems , with respect and appreciation of satire from one who can practice it too, to be the regular posting of a stereotype of an ultra economic liberal , but with views that never veer in any direction otherwise , to the right , left or even in the centre .
This is an intelligent thoughtful article , it deserves a similar response.
John, keep up the good work in your area as a newer member , we need the realistic mainstream voice to win people over to us. I do think the way the later joining countries , from the Eastern European areas John mentions ,were allowed unique status fast by the UK and Eire was a mistake we need to recognise. Freedom of movement need not be as it is now .It was meant to mean the right to take up a job . It could be adapted to self employment and more casual work , to mean within a timescale , if the work ceases , the residency does eventually.
What we need is open debate more than open boarders.That includes us allowing the excellent contributions of Anna Soubry and our terrific Norman Lamb , to go in whatever direction or into whatever organisation they want , for we know they are intelligent moderate pro interntional co operation, as good as it gets from each party .
Face up to reality! The effects on services, housing and jobs are rationalisations that bear little scrutiny; the same specious arguments would apply for restricting birth rates. That the mostly young and mobile immigrants have contributed much more than they have taken was dismissed, and indeed was in fact beside the point; the actual issue was a lot darker.
The overwhelming motivation was against foreigners because they are foreign and the more they appear different by how they look, dress and speak the more strongly the antagonistic sentiment. Why did leave campaigners place so much emphasis on immigration from outside the EU? – Because they understood the sentiment to which they were appealing. The reality, that we should not be blind to, is that it was an overwhelmingly racist campaign and a racist result.
Good luck with that. I can’t even persuade my own mother 🙂 I believe though there will be a soft Brexit with required workers being welcome, including seasonal farm labourers. The irony is that the incoming Europeans are the only section of UK society that pay their own way (no net deficit per capita). It’s highly unlikely that we are going to be as blindly stubborn as the pre-vote EU on migration because frankly that just wouldn’t be possible.
I’d have thought that farmer might have also been concerned about the coming ban on Roundup herbicide; also featured on countryfile with other farmers who reckoned a ban (based largely on one-sided, fear-mongering) would close a lot of marginal farms and force the use of environmentally-worse alternatives. Of course those newly unviable farms may then qualify for more EU subsidies to keep them open. That scenario, in a nutshell, summarises the only problem I have with the EU: Too many self-defeating, ill-thought out rules from inexperienced, badly-informed bureaucrats with no consideration of lost jobs or increased costs and no feedback route to amend them.
This is a very thoughtful article which I welcome. People have been suffering from Thatcherite economics since the 80s but they have been told the EU is to blame. It’s no wonder they voted Leave. In these circumstances when a lot of strangers come into their town and some people lose their jobs to them, what exactly do you expect? It’s all too easy to dismiss their concerns as racism and ignore them but if we as a party do that we will be playing into the present Government’s hands. This has been a wonderful con trick, set in place policies that reward the rich and tell the poor it’s all the fault of the EU. Of course, austerity has been enforced as a policy on euro countries too.
With regard to the language problem, many years ago when I lived in London I taught English to some Indian women as a volunteer. I’m fairly certain that the scheme had the backing of the LA but volunteers went to peoples’ homes and the learning was informal. I took my young baby along with me. Wouldn’t it be possible to have this sort of scheme for EU migrants financed through funding for areas particularly affected by free movement? Maybe it exists already?
At last someone who agrees with me that the referendum result was caused by entirely fixable underlying causes that have nothing to do with the EU. If we make a serious effort to address those issues in the near future (and boy do they need addressing!), the pressure to Brexit will evaporate like morning mist.
These policies must be clearly set out by the Lib-Dems, explaining why staying in the EU is an important part of such an agenda.
@Martin
“That the mostly young and mobile immigrants have contributed much more than they have taken was dismissed” – with respect what evidence do you have that young people who might often be do low-paying jobs and sending money back home make a net contribution – I heard one had to be earning perhaps £25,000/year?
“The overwhelming motivation was against foreigners because they are foreign” – would you support open borders to the rest of the world – if not, why not?
All the best and peace.
@John Bland: “I will never give up on Europe” – if you believe that there should be “open borders” with Europe, why stop there, how about also with the rest of the world – if not, why not?
@Martin “The reality, that we should not be blind to, is that it was an overwhelmingly racist campaign and a racist result.” – so you are calling perhaps 1/2 the UK population racist?
What if Euro scepticism is caused by Europe and Brexit supporters started suggesting that we needed to get tough on the causes of Europhile sentiments, by insisting that remain voters were not really voting in favour of Europe, but were mere confused, possibly Anglophobic and wilfully dismissive of the massive contribution the British make to the economy etc.
I voted Leave because I think the EU project is undemocratic and basically unworkable. Also because the free movement of labour is helping to drive the rise of the hard right across Europe. Historically, nations have sought independence from super states and empires. In other words to me the EU is locked in an autocratic, almost. Imperial view of the world in which cultures are trivialised as little more than local colour to be sold as novelty and ignored in the grander scheme of things.
Most people are not extremists, but the referendum options of remain or leave were extremes. In the Scottish referendum there was debate about a third option, which was not on the ballot paper, but eventually happened, sort of. ‘Take back control’ may be appealing to MPs, but if they try it they will find that the UK is like a cork on the ocean. This is a strange slogan used by people who supported the abolition of exchange control in 1979 by a Tory government, denationalised large parts of the UK economy and even cut staffing levels at the Inland Revenue in order to make it less effective.
The point about speaking foreign languages on the street makes no sense to me. I doubt many groups of Brits abroad only speak the local language among themselves, though there are probably more people in Warsaw who understand English than understand Polish in Southampton. Why would we expect people from other countries to be any different to us in this?
Any large and rapid influx is bound to cause stresses, especially when, as in Britain today, governance is too sclerotic to react flexibly and appropriately. That far I agree with the article.
But that leaves out another aspect; the impact on employment prospects of local people and everything that depends on that. My understanding is (and please correct if wrong) that seasonal agricultural workers have always been part of the scene. If changes in the industry mean that it’s shifted towards more year round employment as stated in the article, then the implication is this is less necessary than formerly and that mass migration from poorer countries is depressing wages to the very great disadvantage of locals which would be enough to make them Eurosceptic – apart, of course, from agribusiness owners like the farmer mentioned.
In his recent speech (covered in a recent article on LDV) Tim Farron was full of fuzzily warm sentiments. But when push comes to shove this clearly doesn’t extend to the ordinary working people. Is it any wonder so many are turning to UKIP that – sort of – pays attention to their concerns?
Also the causes of euroscepticism go far beyond the local stresses covered in this article. The EU as currently constituted is profoundly flawed as the ongoing employment and financial disaster unfolding right across southern Europe reveals. The only proper approach to the EU was always ‘EU-reform’ but Lib Dems have been wilfully blind about the need for institutional change in Brussels preferring instead to cheer-lead for the status quo plus whatever the centralising changes the bureaucrats wanted to make. I’m afraid this is a stance that’s had its comeuppance big-time.
Don’t get me wrong. I am a big supporter of the European ideal but only if it’s built on liberal and democratic lines with the support of the peoples of Europe.
Good article. We have belatedly learned that the only good way to campaign effectively for our place in the EU is to listen hard to all those who disagree, find out what their problems are, and work to resolve those problems. Not to slander them as a bunch of racists, or ignorant fenlanders, or whatever.
Nor to lecture them, as many Labourites do, and say things like “You are deluded to think it is immigration that troubles you. It’s actually inequality that is the problem. What you need is socialism. You fenlanders are just too dumb to recognise that.”
The fenlander should retort, as the article indicates, by saying “Who the heck are you to tell me what my problem is? I don’t like living in England amongst a large number of people who can’t speak English and don’t try. Yes, you middle class people probably delight in living and working with people of a whole range of nationalities, but I’ll bet they all find ways to talk to you and make friends, don’t they? Right, so you are just an insensitive well-off pontificator, and I don’t need to hear any more from you, chum!”
On socialism, the fenlander should retort “OK Mr Corbyn, I agree that there is too much inequality and that the rich are screwing us. But look, inequality is a constant ongoing tug-of-war between the rich and their political opponents. Your prescription is that the good guys should suddenly stary pulling harder. What makes you think that they can actually do that? Let’s face it, we are going to have to live with inequality, like we live with rain, death and taxes. But we don’t have to have massive net inflows of foreigners. That’s something we can actually change. Oh and by the way, what exactly is so morally good about having far more immigrants than emigrants?”
Now, the angry Leave voting fenlander whose views earn my sneaking sympathy is, of course, not always right. As John Bland says, Spalding would struggle economically without its large influx of immigrants. The Brexiteers won’t be able to pull up the drawbridge, and it was dishonest of them to pretend that they would. But Bland also mentions some simple ideas – like encouraging and cajoling immigrants to learn English – which would just show our fenlanders that someone from the metropolis was showing them a bit of respect, doing a bit of real listening.
Sadly, we didn’t listen. We got punished for that. Deservedly so.
Good article.
@Paul Griffiths
It is worth asking (because someone may have an answer) what process/data-gathering/organisational changes would be required so that local public services could respond effectively to “unexpected rapid change”?
Clearly a waiting for the results of a 10 year census is not going to achieve this, nor guarantee the funding reaches the areas affected. The policies that the Liberal Democrats have had with regards to local income tax and more devolved Government would in my view provide a pretty quick way of getting the funds to where it is needed.
@Senseco “We don’t have to imagine it, because it happened. Anyone remember the overspill towns of the 1950s and 1960s? Peterborough and Thetford were two such. It was government policy at the time to transplant Londoners into the East of England. Did it result in the growth of xenophobic politics? Not that I can remember.”
Peterborough was planned over many years with many consultations and exhibitions long before the first hole was dug . What we have seen in the Fens was completely unplanned.
The 1960’s did though see the Rivers of Blood speech from Enoch Powell. That speech was a reaction to a rapid change and mentioned pressures in Schools and Hospitals.
@Lorenzo Cherin One of the things that frustrated me during the Referendum campaign was that we kept hearing about the economic benefits of migration which HMRC have finally provided more detail on https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/further-statistics-on-tax-contribution-of-eea-nationals-for-2013-to-2014 but when people could not see it on the ground because those benefits were not reaching us, it is little wonder we could make little head way when trying to make the remain case.
If the vote had gone the other way, I would be calling for the financial benefits of migration to reach those areas like South Lincolnshire. You only need to see what is happening to our Health service to realise how underfunded we are. As people realise that there is no £350m a week for our NHS, I am hopeful that we will be able to have a good try at holding those who backed the Leave campaign to account.
Nationally though we do need to have the debate about immigration and open those closed minds.
@Sue Sutherland There are two classes of migrants. The first generation are settled, educated and either running businesses or working in the NHS. They are well integrated and had long term plans to stay. Then there are those who are not so well educated , in unskilled work and probably just here for the money – in a way similar to Auf Wiedersehen Pet in reverse.
As for local authority funding there are no such luxuries although the Church has secured some funding from the Diocese of Lincoln and are trying to bring the communities together.
For those interested in the experiences of migrant workers, I would recommend the EU Migrant worker project which has been running throughout the year. http://www.eumigrantworker.law.cam.ac.uk/
John Bland
You are not bland at all , whatever your name says , but a man with interesting and thought provoking things to say , glad of it !
The point about Lincolnshire is that it exists in the wider context of the East Midlands and it is debatable whether mass immigration into the region is beneficial. Leicester is officially the worst place in England to bring up children with Nottingham and Lincoln not far behind. Also if you widen the scope again to include all of the Midlands it actually contradicts the idea that it is areas with low immigration that voted leave. This is not because the financial benefits of change are not being passed on. It’s possibly because outside of London, which is a major business centre with all the attractions and massive infra-structure of one of the worlds international hubs, these benefits do not actually exist. In the case of Lincoln we’re not talking about well paid dynamic careers that could support say local income tax. We’re talking about minimum wage temp jobs etc. It’s arguing that fruit pick should bestow the same benefits on a region as high finance, fashion and media jobs.
P.S
This also answers the other part of the question. The off Licences and one star mini-markets are driven by low incomes. If they stock under the counter tobacco and alcohol it’s because no one can afford the real thing, which puritan taxation is also grossly inflating the price of to the point where it is counter productive. These are symptoms of meagre wages and poor local economies.
‘Peterborough and Thetford were two such. It was government policy at the time to transplant Londoners into the East of England. Did it result in the growth of xenophobic politics?’
My daughter lived and worked in Thetford in the 1990s. She said there were three perceptible communities there; Norfolkers, Londoners and Americans (it’s the nearest town to several US bases). They may or may not have mixed as much as we might have liked but there wasn’t any reported political dimension.
Part of the problem is that, in spite of all the rhetoric, there are limits to central government control on immigration. Westminster likes to pretend that it can control it, but there are pull and push factors that frequently override the government. Setting an arbitrary and unachievable figure (D. Cameron) actually prevents proper realistic planning and support for what actually happens. So local authorities, subject to spending limits, and Westminster/Whitehall, unprepared, don’t carry out their duty of catering for what is actually happening.
Ian Sanderson.
We’re an island. If a government really wanted to control immigration it could do it quite easily. We are not talking about thousands of miles of porous connected borders that can be crossed on foot or by car. Migrants mostly come by plane etc. The question of should a government control it and to what extent are entirely different.
Paul Grifiths rightly asks what process/data-gathering/organisational changes would be required so that local public services could respond effectively to “unexpected rapid change”?
As the food industry in Lincolnshire has grown so fast and attracted more labour, that must have translated into higher tax revenues which HMG must spend on improving and growing the local infrastructure (schools, health care, housing).
There are no significant cultural barriers between ourselves and those from the rest of Europe who settle here (and the ones who remain quickly master our language) so the issue of European immigration in places like Lincolnshire is highly unlikely to be at the root of hostility to the EU in England and Wales. We must look more widely.
A really thoughtful article. At 71 I have lived through waves of incomers. My own family, returning o the UK from India, post Independence, along with other civil servants, teachers, railway and port officials, seconded trainers to the Indian Army, and many others. As a small child I encountered silly comments from other children about “not being here in the Blitz and having a cushy time” (??? how did they know – they were too young to have experienced bombing themselves). In the late ’50’s London Transport brought over PSV drivers from Malta and Cyprus. West Indians followed. We then had
Vietnamese Boat-People, Ugandan Asians, and Asian incomers. Parts of Tower Hamlets had street signs in two (or 3) languages. There was anti-immigrant feeling, and Alf Garnett personified it. Incomers who do not learn the language of their new home made things difficult. Incomers who already spoke English as a second language ( usually from Commonwealth countries ) adapted and contributed to the wider community, and did not move into language ghettos. Oddly, you only have to go to the “Ex Pat” conurbations of Spain and France to meet long term residents who hardly speak Spanish or French, so this failure to integrate, and move into “ex pat settlements”, is not just applicable here. When I worked in Germany as a “Gastarbeiter” in the late ’70’s and early ’80’s, it was state policy to encourage and support incomers to speak German. I worked with Portuguese, Spanish, Turkish and Iranian incomers and our common language was German. I suspect the British inability to value second language skills is part of the current problem and to hear “Do as I say, not as I do” from my fellow citizens who speak only English, could be the root cause of what is happening now.
The tragedy here is that the situation described in the article talks of people who are likely to lose out from Brexit.
If wages costs for food production go up because of fewer immigrants, then so do food prices.
Globalisation is the really big driver. That is beyond the control of any one nation, but we are more protected from its ravages by being in the EU.
It seems that we have the near-impossible task of simultaneously stopping Brexit (or finding a solution that’s sufficiently like EU membership to minimise damage) and healing the social divisions behind the Leave vote.
From a specifically LibDem angle, I guess this means messaging loudly and clearly whenever Brexit proposals will lead to damage, or expose failures of the Tories. For starters, austerity was abandoned a little too quickly by Philip Hammond on becoming Chancellor: if it were essential it would not have been abandoned, if it were not essential, why was it followed through despite the damage being done (which now includes Brexit)?
John Bland’s article is so good because it lists things which are practical. But there is also something which has nothing to do with facts. Almost the whole British press created a hostile and negative atmosphere over the last 20 years. Lord Leveson’s findings are damning
“There can be no objection to agenda journalism (which necessarily involves the fusion of fact and comment) but that cannot trump a requirement to report stories accurately. Clause 1 of the Editors Code explicitly , and in my view rightly, recognizes the right of a free press to be partial; strong,even very strong opinions can legitimately influence the choice of story, placement of story and angle from which a story can be reported. But that must not lead to fabrication, or deliberate or careless misrepresentation of the facts.” Amongst other things the inquiry heard a long list of thing which were published in British newspapers as being things that Brussels proposed to ban including – Scottish kilts, mushy peas, British made lavatories, charity shops, the British Army, lorry drivers with glasses, lollipop ladies.
20 years ago Boris Johnson was sacked by the Times for lying but he moved on to the Telegraph and more colourful facts sold newspapers so other editors followed. There was definate hostility to the EU by newspaper owners who do not live or pay taxes in the UK and this was wonderful grist to the mill.
Glenn
We’re not an island. We have a 300 mile (500 km) land border with the Irish Republic for a start. It was always leaky, even in times of war or terrorist emergency.
Also I think you have too much faith in the efficacy of water as a barrier. You don’t have to a great navigator to make a risky one-off journey across the English Channel or the North Channel. Even in times of war there was clandestine traffic in and out of the UK, including smuggling.
The pull factor of the UK maintains a considerable and profitable people-trafficking industry as it is. ‘Controlling our borders’ is not free, and, if it is seen as strict, it provides more business opportunities for those who offer clandestine entry.
@Richard Boyd
“Oddly, you only have to go to the “Ex Pat” conurbations of Spain and France to meet long term residents who hardly speak Spanish or French, so this failure to integrate, and move into “ex pat settlements”, is not just applicable here.”
Absolutely. And I suspect that members of those ex pat communities would, if they were living in the Fens, be moaning about the immigrants not speaking English.
@Ian Sanderson
“We’re not an island…..
……Also I think you have too much faith in the efficacy of water as a barrier. You don’t have to a great navigator to make a risky one-off journey across the English Channel or the North Channel.”
Absolutely. And the amount of coastline we have is VERY large – depending on how accurately it is measured – somewhere between around 12,400 km and 19,700 km ( see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_length_of_coastline). Whatever the figure the amount of coastline to be monitored in relation to the UK area is very high.
As someone clearly of genuine liberal conscience and a strong pro-European, John Bland must have found this article difficult to write. He should be commended for his honesty and it is good that most of the posters on this thread have addressed the points he makes with understanding. Like many others I am uncomfortable about Lib Dems referring to ourselves as representing the “48” and facing down the “52”. It is certainly not as simple as that and John’s plea not to write off the entire 52 with insulting words must be right. I think it is fair to say that those areas of the country which have always depended upon migrant labour are rather different from the rest. Many of these are migrants in the ongoing sense, coming here in the harvesting season and going back again afterwards. They are less likely to integrate and to learn English and will often put up with very poor housing and living conditions. Elsewhere immigration is usually quite different. People who come here to settle will of course initially talk in their native language and seek to bolster their own culture but history shows that widespread, albeit gradual, integration occurs. Can anyone distinguish the Poles who came here after the 2nd world war from anyone else, apart from their unusual surnames? In London where I live, people of foreign origin may well speak their original language when in a group of their fellows but will reply in perfect English when addressed by natives.
The rate of change is often the greatest difficulty. I do myself wonder whether there is any possibility of some reappraisal at EU level of total freedom of movement. It was feasible when the EU was a more concentrated group of nations at a relatively similar level of economic development. The inclusion of a whole range of countries from the former Soviet block (and what a triumph that was for Europe and the world) was always bound to cause real difficulties in terms of people understandably seeking a new life -albeit draining enterprise and expertise from their native countries in the process. Perhaps we in the EU as a whole are still in denial as to the immense challenge this presents.
Ian so we’re have a border in Northern Island with Southern Island, neither of which have high levels of immigration. In fact outside of England the British Isles have low populations and not a great deal of inward immigration. People are not going to Ireland or Scotland to enter England illegally. They are mostly arriving at Heathrow or any of the other major legal roots into England. In other words most immigration into Britain is happening perfectly legally via normal travel roots. Most of the illegal immigration is not achieved by people trafficking, but by people arriving through legal means and then falling off the radar. People trafficking brings in trickles of people not hundreds of thousands a year. We have a relatively small coastline. By the way Clandestine operation during World War two from our side were backed by a large Navy and Large Air force with the full co-operation of the Government, whilst from the other side it involved a few dozen people here and there with very little success.. The truth is Liberals mostly believe in open borders, which is a perfectly honourable position to take, so present arguments that make them look inevitable and there is no real will to do much about it elsewhere either because it adds to the idea of Britain as a world hub and is seen as progressive. . But if you actually wanted to do it, it would not be that hard.
The Brexit campaign was self evidently racist. Do I need to clarify? The campaign gave licence to antipathy towards foreigners.
The continual banging on about so many million Turkish Muslims targeted xenophobic attitude. Turkey is not in the EU. The one country that has been promoting Turkish accession has in fact been the UK, but contrary to denials by Brexit ministers, every EU country has a veto. Why did they deny this truth? For the cynical objective of raising the Turkish bogeyman, but so far as the issue in question was concerned it was an utter red herring.
Then refugees were highlighted. Perhaps we could have a referendum on leaving the UN, if people do not want to accept UN protocols on refugee status. Refugees, illegal immigrants, immigrants and EU nationals were deliberately conflated to appeal to irrational motivations. It worked and doubtless in time there will be some who will be ashamed of their vote. There will be others who will not mind that they were seduced by a racist campaign and still more who will simply not understand how they were manipulated.
The author of this piece lets slip his guard when he refers to “foreign languages being spoken in the streets“. Perhaps he should try out that argument in the Welsh valleys, perhaps he has never been abroad, I very much doubt is multilingual since linguistic intolerance is a form of racism and the British are notoriously linguistically intolerant. We should be promoting language competence. Indeed on the continent, since 23.6, I have felt more self conscious speaking English in public and despite an evident accent often speak French.
The causes of ‘euroscepticism’ (not really the right word) are a rejection of an enforced ‘ever closer union’ and all that flows from that.
This has been a really interesting discussion and I’m hoping that if we carry on campaigning for EU membership we will also be campaigning for the rights of those left behind by austerity economics, or structural economic change. Just a couple of points.
London wasn’t the only city which voted to remain, I think most of the major cities did so. Manchester certainly did, so I do hope we can avoid the London versus the rest attitude which I’ve noticed occasionally.
The second is that I understand that the fruit pickers are not all unskilled migrants because skilled people are earning more money here doing this sort of job than they would in their own country doing skilled jobs. This is an enormous waste of talent which I don’t think the EU has addressed.
We have also let down our poorest people in ways other than financial. Beveridge’s evils included idleness which became unfashionable as a cause during the immediate post war years and onwards. As a consequence we now have people who don’t know about how to work: that you have to turn up, be on time, work hard, have breaks but not for most of the time, don’t answer your mobile phone, if your Mum tells you to do something which interferes with your work you can’t do it ( the Mums need training too!) and other simple things that make you a good employee. They have also lost the joy of achievement as a result. I don’t know if schools are trying to teach these values and habits but all of us need to learn them and sometimes graduates can be just as lost in the world of work.
Perhaps it’s time to address the lack of these skills?
@Martin “The Brexit campaign was self evidently racist. Do I need to clarify? The campaign gave licence to antipathy towards foreigners. The continual banging on about so many million Turkish Muslims targeted xenophobic attitude.”
Since the Remain campaign highlighted all of the reasons why Turkey should not be allowed to join the EU, perhaps it was more racist than the Brexiters’ more welcoming approach …
It was seventy five million Turks the ones whom I was leafleting (Remain)had been told and believed, daunting for anyone any race surely.
@Martin “The Brexit campaign was self evidently racist. Do I need to clarify? The campaign gave licence to antipathy towards foreigners.” – with respect, I would assume that racism is an offence – as you appear to feel so strongly about this, have you already made a formal complaint to the police, etc. – surely it would be a quick conviction? And are the 52% who voted to run an independent country from the EU, also racist in your opinion? All the best and peace.
Although we are where we are – would anyone choose to create a multicultural society if we could go back in time?
The Windrush generation have had a hard enough time since they arrived after WW2 – despite being generally of generous heart – they have suffered greatly.
The US has of course no choice other than to be multicultural – since nearly everybody there is from an immigrant family originally [or perhaps invaders is a better term]. However, given that our ancestors would kill or enslave all of the men and rape the women after defeating another tribe – which meant that the tribe stayed as a single family – is multiculturalism something to be sought?
Around 90% of Chinese – the longest continuios civilisation – consider themselves as belonging to the Han family not even different tribes from the same land.
By multicultural – I mean significant numbers of other cultures.
Thank you everyone for your contributions. As I earn my crust during the day, I have been unable to respond to the points raised , and as I am heading of to London early tomorrow, I will come back to this discussion later in the weekend.
@Richard Boyd does make some valuable points that due to limitations on article size , I was unable to make. We have indeed been here before.
In the history of South Lincolnshire & the Fens there was a similar period of racial disharmony combined with rapid change. This was when a significant Huguenot population settled in the Fens many of whom were engaged in the early C17th major fen drainage schemes masterminded by the Dutchman Cornelius Vermuyden and funded by the Duke of Bedford. They too experienced significant prejudice and ill feeling from the native Fenman. All of which is now forgotten to the vast majority.
Like Huguenots, those who have come from Eastern Europe have one advantage. The colour of their skin. Their descendants have the potential to integrate far more easily into the local community than those of African and Asian origin. This is already happening in the Schools http://www.spaldingtoday.co.uk/news/education/adults-behaving-badly-can-learn-a-lot-from-the-kids-1-6701473 .With the right support, the area has the potential to become one of the most culturally European parts of the country.
This time though, we must celebrate our heritage and history, as we may need to refer to it again.
Yes John Roffey, I would choose to be a multi cultural society. Think of the boredom of everyone looking the same, believing the same, cooking the same food, wearing the same clothes etc. Yes, the Windrush generation did suffer terrible racism but this is their country now and I believe we are a much greater nation because of their bravery and that of other people who have chosen to make this country their home. I feel proud and moved that people from other nations want to live in the country I grew up in. Of course there are problems but when was anything worthwhile easy to achieve?
Sue Sutherland 3rd Sep ’16 – 12:42pm
‘Yes John Roffey, I would choose to be a multi cultural society. Think of the boredom of everyone looking the same, believing the same, cooking the same food, wearing the same clothes etc.’
I don’t recall being bored, Sue, before the huge intake of recent years. Mind you – food is not a particular passion of mine.
I was really thinking more of those that came here – to face a difficult time. Those who speak English well and do not look much different to the nationals usually can integrate – but those who don’t and/or cannot face a hard time.
Yes there are measures that can be taken to help – but are these problems that you would take on – if it wasn’t necessary?
Sue
I dunno, whenever I travel I don’t really look at the locals and think they’re bland. insular, mean spirited and homogenised because where they live is not multicultural enough.
If England (leave aside the other countries of the UK) had not been multicultural, English would not exist. Multiculture is English culture and has been for the last 2 millennia. John Roffey, I find your comments deeply disturbing.
Martin 3rd Sep ’16 – 2:10pm
I am sorry to have disturbed you Martin – can you explain why?
As you probably realise – I was simply trying to establish a principle as to whether a multicultural society is one to be sought – given the difficulties these have and are likely to bring. Also, whether or not we have been brainwashed by successive governments into believing that multiculturalism is desirable – to support their wish to bring in cheap labour from elsewhere to drive wage rates down – so that large corporations in the UK [who are very influential] are able to make increased profits at the expense of the poorest and weakest in our society.
If you feel the need to go back before recent times – when, I think you will find, wage negotiations took quite a different form. The Romans understood the Britons to be the indigenous people of Britain – although I am not sure this is of any help in our discussion.
Multiculturalism is really only an acknowledgment of a human tendency towards tribalism. The main problem with it in the political sense is that it can turn into a kind of institutionalised separation and block against liberal ideas about equality. So you can end up this confused hodge podge of alliances that somehow tries to link genuinely progressive forces for personal freedom with incredibly repressive religiosity through simplistic ideas about institutionalised repression (despite the very obvious fact that most of the repressive laws have been repealed and intuitions are constantly introducing reforms) and through the idea that the embodiment of social evil is a mythical straight white male oppressor or some such. None of this is to say that the old order was perfect or that institution should or not draw people from a wider section of the public or that straight white males are oppressed and shouldn’t be challenged where appropriate, but simply to point out that political multiculturalism is a set contradictory forces held together by pieties.
The official Leave Campaign banged on about Turks who are brown and Muslim. Farage’s ” Breaking Point ” poster featured refugees/migrants who are brown and Muslim. It’s really quite striking how EU immigration wasn’t the focus of the campaign. It was an explicitly racist and Xenophobic campaign but it evoked brown Muslims as it’s ” Other ” not for instance Poles.
It’s an interesting article by the way. But John Bland needed worry too much. Post Brexit the local jobs he’s referring to which are attracting his problem immigrants will split 3 ways. #1 A few will pay slightly better increasing the cost of Food. #2 Some will be done by the same demographic. They’ll just have a 3 year work visa rather than an EU passport. #3 Some will disappear abroad due the increased costs of #1 + #2. The end result is your area will have 90% of the same problems and be fractionally poorer. But you’ll have taken back control so it’ll all be alright.
@Yellow Submarine: “The official Leave Campaign banged on about Turks who are brown ” – with respect when did anyone make an explicit reference to skin colour, ever? Also, it was understood that limiting EU migration would limit Poles = pale skin. All the best and peace.
Actually both campaigns banged on about the Turkey, with remain making a big song and dance not about racism against Turkish people, but about how UKIP were unnecessarily fear mongering because Turkey could never join the EU!
We ARE a multiracial/cultural society so we need to make the best of it. In 1962 we stopped Commonwealth citizens coming in freely, possibly on racist grounds, I don’t know, but in 1972 we let in 27,000 Ugandan Indians who were under threat from Idi Amin because we had promised to.
It is shaming that we are hardly allowing refugees in in 2016.
A point that may be worth making is that at one time, a decision that would hurt farming in a rural, farming area would have been unpopular there. Now most people in farming areas do not depend in any obvious way on farming. They can sound off about foreigners, but won’t be much bothered if local farms get into difficulties; and of course, the non-UK workforce didn’t have a vote.
However, the Fens and much of Lincolnshire do represent areas where large-scale immigration of people not speaking English as a first language has brought real problems. The benefits are not obvious to most of the established local residents, but the disbenefits are. The government should have done more to overcome the problems, yes – funding free English classes, for example. We have to remember, though, that high Brexit votes also occurred in places where there were very few immigrants but immigration was still blamed for just about everything – and in places where “immigrant” seems to have been taken to mean “non-white”.