The hard-left site Evolve Politics notes approvingly that a clip from Nick Robinson's Panorama has 'gone viral' "because it shows just how stupid the UK's obsession with immigration is".
It's a clip that Nick Robinson himself obviously felt was important too, as he tweeted it first; indeed, it's the only clip he directly tweeted from the programme:
Here's a fuller version of it:Who should we let in ? Voters who want to see immigration cut often struggle to say who they would stop coming here. Watch more on my @BBCPanorama on immigration after Brexit on @BBCiPlayer pic.twitter.com/4dPfNLHCLo— Nick Robinson (@bbcnickrobinson) March 8, 2018
.@bbcnickrobinson asks the people on #Panorama: “Do you think we need to cut immigration?”— Damon Evans (@damocrat) March 7, 2018
People: “Yes!”
“So who should we let in?” - goes through job list. “You want to see immigration cut, but every single job I showed you, you said we need them from abroad.”
🤦🏼♂️ pic.twitter.com/V1kgWuov4l
Its not very scientific I know but but the majority of people I speak to in our area just have a sense that there is too much immigration has has been for the last few years. It is difficult for them to define and put into words and everyone fears being called a racist.
ReplyDeleteI live in a rural area that relies on significant numbers of eastern europeans for farm work and for all job Brits won't do.
Our locality is changing whether it be Romanian beggars on our main shopping street, foreign languages being in the majority at our local coffee shop and 20% of the local primary school intake being Polish.
Like the man in the clip they understand the need for migrant labour but can see the sheer numbers are putting services under pressure and feel uneasy about the changes.
Things aren't the same and there is a warm nostalgic glow when looking back at how we used to live.
But what to do, if anything?
Where to begin with Nasty Nick and his silly little trick? This is a completely bogus sleight of hand on his part, well worthy of the BBC which is essentially now nothing for than a 24/7 lie machine. Perhaps he should ponder this:
ReplyDeleteIf I were married to Nick (sound unlikely, but in these times everything is possible) and were to suggest to him we needed to reduce the amount of frozen vegetables we keep buying as the freezer is too cluttered, no doubt he would give me that beady-eyed look of his and ask triumphantly: "Are you saying you don't want us to buy frozen peas? Or is it frozen cabbage? Or maybe frozen beans you don't? How about frozen corn? Or even frozen parsnips? "
I of course would turn to him and say "What the f*** are you on about Nick...I just said we need to buy less frozen veg so we don't clutter up the freezer. I never said we should stop buying a particular type of frozen veg. Have you lost your mind? I specifically said the amount...so buy smaller packs and don't duplicate. Got it? "
It was in any case a bogus exercise. He didn't have categories for "criminals", "professional beggars" or "welfare cheats". Everyone would have agreed about those. And if he had included pizza deliverers, shop security staff, retail workers, coffee shop baristas and the like, might he have started to get some different answers in any case...plus of course this is the edited version. Who knows what they chose not to show.
Re crop pickers, if you go on You Tube you will find that for any given crop there is a machine to pick it.
There seems no will on the part of the UK government to promote cost-effective automation.
I once looked into the issue of medical and care workers and found that at maximum we would be looking to take in about 80,000 medical and care staff each year. But we have over 500,000 coming into the country. What do they all end up doing? Do we really need huge numbers of chefs? I'd say no and if we are talking about high end establishments, well they can cover the full cost of migration.
We definitely need employers to pay an infrastructure levy on all migrants to reflect the costs of net migration. That will help equalise things as will withdrawing the right of migrants to access UK benefits - the employer should cover those. Likewise we need time limted work permits and no automatic route to UK naturalisation save for exceptional cases.
I should have said I'm my post above - Nick and his producer knew exactly what they were doing, as MB says it was a nasty little trick and sleight of hand - they knew it would enable them to validate the BBC narrative.
DeleteBut of course it doesn't..... because theyrefuse to even acknowledge the concerns that led to Brexit, never mind addressing them constructively in a programme like this.
Instead the sneer at anyone who isn't of their worldview. And a middle-aged white male in the provinces is a perfect target.