Good intentions are not enough to control borders
Only backbone and political will can fix our borders
Well, what a week, and it’s not over yet. Lurking in the midst of the political soap opera there were two stories that in different circumstances might have attracted a little more attention. The government is at least making an effort to tackle illegal immigration. Not that the problem is about to be solved. There was an announcement this week that the Home Secretary is proposing to publish what the press have labelled ‘league tables’, which will rank countries according to how promptly they document and take back their nationals who have failed in their asylum claims or are criminals released from prison. The intention is to treat more favourably those countries who play ball with us and place them at the top of the list for legal immigration. It sounds good on paper but will do little to change things on the ground. As our Chairman Alp Mehmet told GB News’s Colin Brazier this week (see below), the real impactful changes will occur when pressure is applied on governments locally. League and performance tables, intended for domestic consumption, have little impact in poor, migration-source (and sometimes corrupt) countries.
This week also saw the welcome news that a major people-smuggling ring has been smashed by a joint operation involving French, Belgian, German and Dutch crime agencies and the British authorities. This is good news, both for British citizens and the victims of these horrible criminal gangs. However, we must not let the headlines blind us to the fact that long-term change will only come when we remove the incentives that attract people-smuggling in the first place. We must also stop Britain from being seen as a soft touch on asylum (see our blog on this). Common sense control and enforcement of existing laws is all that is needed. And, a bit of political will to stand up to the open borders brigade.
Blog of the week
Nearly 7 Million New Registrations By Migrants With General Practitioners Since 2010
Our services are under severe pressure, not least from the uncontrolled mass immigration of recent decades. Remember, census figures released a couple of weeks ago revealed an increase in the population of England and Wales of 6.3% or 3.5 million people in just 10 years, largely driven by immigration and children born to immigrants. Additional demand of this magnitude makes life ravaged by the cost-of-living crisis and dealing with post-pandemic problems, and dealing with the beleaguered NHS, so much more difficult. You might also like to read a blog we wrote recently on an analysis of statistics produced by the Office for National Statistics (based upon data from NHS Digital) showing that there have been about seven million registrations by migrants with GPs in the past decade or so. An average of 56% of all registrations, or about 3.9 million out of 6.9 million (just under 390,000 per year) were in London, the South East and East of England regions. Read our full blog here.
Migration Watch in the news
We’ve been featured widely again this week in the national media. See below:
GB News: We must deport convicted foreign criminals
‘All I’m saying is that this business of league tables… it’s not going to put any pressure on countries who are slow in taking back their nationals.’
‘If they’ve shown that they can work together on something like this then I don’t see why we shouldn’t be working together with regard to the wider problem. These people who arrive on our shores… wherever they’ve come from, they haven’t suddenly become illegal, they’ve been illegal pretty much from the moment they entered the EU.’
The chairman of Migration Watch UK, Alp Mehmet, describes these anti-raid protesters as “vigilantes”, saying: “There can be no excuse for preventing the police or immigration authorities from enforcing the law.”
Make your voice heard
Whatever Boris Johnson may or may not have done to bring about his own downfall, he was never an enthusiast for firm immigration control or lower levels of immigration. That is a huge pity because it is exactly what many of those who voted for the Conservatives in 2019 do want. They feel let down by what has happened in the past couple of years both with illegal and legal immigration (one million long term visa grants in 2021!). If the next leader of the party and Prime Minister wants the votes of those who put Boris Johnson’s administration into office, he or she can, even now, start to give thought to how he or she will deliver on the promises made in the last election. When the political class ignore the needs and wants of the voter, as they have done for two decades on mass immigration, ultimately they will pay the price. To drive this point home, why not consider writing to your MP and tell him/her that your vote is not to be taken for granted, especially if immigration is not dramatically reduced.