Category: Uncategorised

^{Photo by Daniel Schludi on Unsplash}

It’s the hot topic of the moment, of course, and for something so important the level of public debate on the topic is staggeringly low.

It might help to just set out a basic framework of points that we might like to consider, a key one being that one ought either to “support” or “object to” immigration – it isn’t that type of thing. You can neither have a free-for-all, nor can you turn it off like a tap; neither of those positions is tenable.

It’s not going to get better either. Currently, many migrants are refugees displaced by conflict, but in the future such refugees might be fleeing ever less hospitable homelands, as climate disruption worsens.

We have to be able to have sensible conversations about immigration, informed by fact and not conjecture, or political bias. As with anything, there will be pros and cons and we should, as a society, be able to understand and navigate these.

What are the good bits?

The positives of immigration are economic and cultural. Economic benefits are obvious when you have a ready-made workforce, many of whom arrive at working age, and contribute to our economy, which may not have carried the burden of educating and training them.

They fill labour shortages, consume goods and services, and records indicate that immigrants start businesses at a higher than normal rate, and those arriving with a high level of skills contribute significantly to our capabilities as innovators and global competitors.

Culturally, we get new input, from food to art and language, and customs and ideas.

And the less good bits?

Obviously there are issues, often mostly at a community level, with integration. Some immigrants are reticent to learn our language, adapt to our culture, and prefer to stick to their own.

Resources, such as housing, schooling, and healthcare can become strained by large numbers of immigrants in specific areas, and there can be resentment caused by competition for lower-paid or less skilled work.

Poor public education can lead to the assumption that immigrants are being treated advantageously, or may be here illegally, top the detriment of the local population. Of course, it may indeed be the case that people are here illegally, often trafficked in as cheap labour, and paid off the books by unscrupulous employers.

^{Photo by Eric Prouzet on Unsplash}

How do we deal with it?

The best approach is to look at what other countries do, and how well or poorly those initiatives work.

Point systems and quotas – countries like Canada and Singapore maintan strict controls over the skills that they are looking for, and the quotas of varying skills that they will admit. Typically these differentiate by skills – the higher-skilled you are the more points, and the larger quota. Germany operates a fast-track visa system for in-demand skills.

Settlement and integration – Canada provides government-funded language classes, and cultural integration support. Sweden does a similar thing.

Opportunity – the most attractive option for many immigrants will be eventual citizenship of the country they have chosen to make their home. The possibility of this happening varies widely. Countries like Singapore control it very tightly, others less so, although in recent years many countries have begun to revisit the criteria because of the extreme pressure the immigration systems have experienced.

Tensions – one aspect that is common across most countries, to a greater of lesser extent, is tension. Resentment runs high, political; debate is divisive, and most information being circulated is wrong.

A Code of Best Practice

How about we propose a simple and sensible (I hope!) code of best practice, which will not be set in stone, but will adapt as our requirements change, mostly to attract the skills that we need at a given time.

1. Clear and unambiguous criteria – whether points, quotas, earning levels etc. doesn’t matter, but the rules should be the same for all, and should be effectively implemented.
2. Skill pathways – perhaps the criteria above can be set for a range of different requirements and skill levels, depending on what we need.
3. Integration support – ways to access language and cultural integration, and an obligation to use the support provided.
4. Clear opportunities and ‘ground-rules’ – unambiguous rules about dependents, citizenship, and the length of time immigrants can stay in the country, or earn the right to remain permanently.
5. Public Information – this is critical. Trustworthy, reliable, and accurate information about the benefits, the problems, and the numbers.

If we are ever going to take the heat out of the immigration issue, we desperately need a higher standard of public information, and we need corrupt politicians to stop lying about the issue for their own gain.

It isn’t controversial to suggest that we live in divided times. This is nothing new – humans have been fighting and arguing for millennia – but perhaps we now have a new twist, provided by the very medium I am using here: the internet.

Previously, the world moved at a more leisurely pace, or news certainly did. Now, information can cross the world in milliseconds, and be read by countless millions. In theory this is wonderful, and a huge opportunity for humanity, but it seems that we can’t have nice things.

However, the internet is not the entire cause of our problems, although it enables quite a few of them. There is no single reason, but I have uncovered a few here:

Inequality

This is a big one. The massive growth in inequality over recent decades has, of course, created a huge amount of resentment on the part of those at the bottom of the scale, as well as a desire to retain and expand their wealth from those at the top.

If people feel uncomfortable, or resentful, they will be easy targets for populist politicians.

Identity Politics

I personally dislike this phrase, largely because it has turned into a term of abuse in some quarters. However, it’s a valid way of describing groups whose politics is strongly influenced by some sort of identity, whether it’s racial, religious, gender-based, or whatever.

Humans are tribal creatures, so it feels natural to support your home town, or your home football team, and much of your worldview is formed by people who share a similar set of values.

However, these are largely personal drivers and feelings – when they are attacked by other people, it’s easy for the situation to feel personal, increasing the tensions.

Broken political systems

^{Photo by Phil Hearing on Unsplash}

It’s easy to say that we have lost confidence in many of our politicians but our systems, especially the electoral system, allow blatant abuse by people who lack integrity.

The First Past The Post method in the UK encourages politicians to “game” the system – putting certain people into safe seats, and messing with boundaries to try and improve their chances.

It’s also wildly unrepresentative – in the July 2024 General Election, the Labour Party took 63% of the Parliamentary seats with 18% of the electorate (including those who didn’t vote). This was an even more extreme result than Boris Johnson’s 2019 victory, which gave his administration 56% of the seats with only 28% of the electorate.

20 million people didn’t bother to vote in 2024 (15 million had opted out in 2019), in times when it possibly matters more than it has done for many years – such is the distrust and distaste for Westminster and its occupants.

Proponents of the system claim that it delivers a definitive result, which it clearly does. What it also does is stifle any need for politicians to collaborate or cooperate, which seems in my view unhealthy.

Rhetoric

Partly as a result of highly polarised political system, built for confrontation and not collaboration – benches facing each other over a divide, in “opposition” – we have politicians who indulge in extreme rhetoric, often slandering and demonising their opponents on a personal level, instead of engaging in sensible debates about policy.

This is something the internet has made worse – the search for the “soundbite” or the viral social media post seems often to overtake common sense, and certainly integrity and decency. The deeper the division, and the more polarising the comment, the more reaction you will get online.

We won’t get into lies here, but obviously a lot of what is said by politicians is easily provable to be incorrect – misrepresented at best, and totally false at worst.

Community and Institutions

“All the world’s a stage” was never more true than today when the world is indeed a stage for anyone with a smartphone or computer. You no longer have to go down to the pub and argue politics with the same half dozen people, most of whom you grew up with and agree with.

Many institutions, from the local Working Men’s Club, to the Conservative Club, the church, trade union clubs, and assorted local societies and community centres are all much thinner on the ground than they used to be. We can all talk to far more people from our armchair than we can by going to any of those places.

This is a fundamental shift in society, and possibly accelerated by the Covid pandemic as well. The problem with it is that you come across far fewer opposing views in an environment where you are likely to be more accepting of them, as they are expressed by people you may well know personally.

Nowadays you are far more likely to make friends with people not from your street or your town, but who “fit” with your worldview.

Echo Chambers

Social media polarises by design – the algorithms will show you content that they think you want to see. This will be content that aligns with posts and comments that you have made yourself, obviously, as the algorithm has nothing else to work with.

This increases bias, exaggerates political differences, and effectively elevates what ought to be perfectly normal differences of opinion into a clash between opposing worldviews.

Before you know where you are, there are only two polarised, divided, black and white positions – the one you hold and “the other side”. The logical extension of this is that your opposers become almost alien – people who you can’t believe could possibly see things the way that they do, given all the evidence and support you have all around you for what you believe.

The “other side” here are often pitched by the populists as a mysterious “elite” and in the UK, class-ridden as we already are, that has proved fertile ground.

^{Photo by Marius Oprea on Unsplash}

We have to do better than this – our world faces many challenges, from climate change to pandemics, and there are many risks to our ways of life. The traditional human response to crisis is to pull together, and to collaborate, to find a solution – that’s why we have been so successful as a species.

Although we are tribal by nature we are built to have compassion, and to cooperate. Almost everything we are confronted with online runs counter to this – it is trying to divide us, almost always to the benefit of a very small number of people who lack most of the qualities of basic humanity.

We are better than this.