Immigration: The great deception

The great deception: Immigration 25 times higher than ever before

by SIR ANDREW GREEN
21st April 2007
Daily Mail

For many years now, the Government and the liberal Left's case for mass immigration has rested partly on their repeated assertion that Britain is a melting pot of different cultures - or as they describe it, "a nation of immigrants".

Our history, we have been told, is punctuated by regular waves of substantial numbers of immigrants to our shores; from the Romans to the Normans, from the Huguenots of the 16th and 17th centuries to the Jews of the 19th and 20th, in-comers have settled here over the centuries and have influenced the racial and cultural make-up of this country for the better.

The slogan was first promoted in Britain in 2001 by the then immigration minister Barbara Roche, who pronounced that "the UK is a nation of immigrants".


Britain's inner cities have been transformed by immigration: But is it true that we have always accepted such numbers? In the EU, only Germany has a larger population.





This absurd claim will finally bite the dust with the publication today of an important new book - A Nation Of Immigrants? by Professor David Conway, senior research fellow for the political think-tank Civitas.

Of course we have immigrants in Britain, nowadays in substantial numbers: yesterday, official figures from the Office of National Statistics revealed how immigration has swollen Britain's population by nearly 1.5 million just in the decade since 1995 (and Britain's population will grow faster than any other major country in Europe between now and 2050).

And, of course, many of them have made, and continue to make, a considerable contribution to our life as a nation. The list of distinguished people is a long one and our country would be different and, very possibly, less vigorous without them.

But that is entirely different from suggesting that we are, by nature, a nation of immigrants - with the implication that present levels of immigration are merely a continuation of past trends, a continuation of the process that has made us what we are.

Any such claim falls apart when examined closely, as Professor Conway has demonstrated. He looked at the scale of previous waves of immigration and found that they were far smaller than the massive inflows which we are now facing.

A certain amount depends on how far back you go. Britain has been an island for some 8,000 years - before that, it was connected to mainland Europe.

The earliest population were hunter-gatherers running only to a few thousand. A big increase in population, some 6,000 years ago, seems to have been due to the arrival of new techniques of farming and a consequent boost to food production, rather than to a large inflow of people.

By the time of the Roman invasion of Britain in 41AD, the inhabitants of Britain numbered some 1.5 million. The Anglo-Saxons and Danes of the Dark Ages were the most significant subsequent arrivals - yet their numbers were never overwhelming and the population remained roughly at 1.5 million until the Norman Conquest of 1066.


The Anglo-Saxons, founders of the English nation. They spoke "Englisc" and called their new land "Anglaland".



For practical purposes, the arrival of the Normans in 1066 is the sensible place to start an assessment of the impact of immigration on our society. To go back further is to get lost in the mists of time.

And when you look at the record of the past 1,000 years, the number of people who arrived in Britain from elsewhere is extremely small - even when you take into account the much lower populations of earlier times.

Furthermore, in almost every case, their arrival was spread over decades rather than years.

William the Conqueror arrived with only around 10,000 troops of largely French extraction. The total number of Norman settlers in Britain was never more than 5 per cent of the population, but they seized the levers of power and grabbed a third of the land.

In the subsequent 1,000 years, there have been only two numerically significant migrations into Britain - the Huguenots in the 16th and 17th centuries and the Jews in the 19th and 20th centuries. Professor Conway's work reveals that both were surprisingly limited in scale.

The Huguenots were Protestants driven out of Catholic France by religious persecution. The first wave came in the second half of the 16th century and a larger, wave followed in the late 17th century.

The total number settling in Britain has been estimated at 40,000 - still only 1 per cent of the population at the time. Many brought valuable skills, some were affluent and their impact was generally beneficial - but they were still a tiny number.

It was another 200 years before the assassination of Tsar Alexander II in 1881 triggered pogroms in Russia and Poland. Between 1880 and 1914, it is estimated that some three million Jews left Eastern Europe and Russia.

The majority went to the U.S., while some 150,000 settled in Britain, arriving at the rate of perhaps 10,000 a year.

They were followed in the period between the two World Wars by perhaps 70,000 others fleeing Nazi Germany. It hardly needs to be said that they have made an outstanding contribution to our society.

But again the numbers are tiny. Taken together, they amounted to roughly half a per cent of our population at the time, spread over half a century.

Professor Conway also looked at the Irish migration of the 19th century. This is a quite different case, as Ireland was part of Great Britain, in full political union with England, Scotland and Wales at the time (now just the 6 northernmost counties are part of Britain), but the numbers are interesting.

Irish-born adults living in mainland Britain doubled from 300,000 to 600,000 in the 20 years around the potato famine of the mid-19th century - again, some 1 per cent of Britain's population at the time, spread over decades. Even by 1880, the Irish community in Britain was only 3 per cent of the population.

The claim that Britain is a nation of immigrants is even more bizarre when you consider that, between 1815 and 1914, Britain quadrupled her population and yet still dispatched more than 20 million people to destinations beyond Europe.


The Irish Potato Famine of the 1840s was one of the worst disasters to befall Great Britain (at the time, the whole of the island of Ireland was part of Britain). The famine was caused by potato blight (a fungus known to science as Phytophthora Infestans) and caused 1,000,000 to starve death and forced a further 2,000,000 to emigrate.




The reality is that we have historically been a country of emigration, not immigration.

Indeed, that situation persisted up to the mid-1980s, when immigration first exceeded emigration.

Why all this focus on numbers? First, because they disprove the Government's claim, so one more falsehood on immigration collapses on examination.

Second, because numbers do matter. And the larger they are, the more they matter. And third, because, although it may not be politically correct to say so, culture matters too.

The Huguenots and the Jews were both of European, Judeo Christian culture and so more easily integrated into our society.

We are taking large numbers from cultures very distant from our own and from each other.

Unlike the U.S. - which is, indeed, a nation of immigrants - we have no mechanisms for absorbing such a mix of people.

The concept of 'multiculturalism', allowing different groups of immigrants to pursue their own cultural agenda without regard to the indigenous population, was an attempt to avoid the issue.

Its disastrous failure was demonstrated on 7/7 in the London Tube bombings carried out by men brought up in Britain.

Consider the present position. In the two years 2004 and 2005, foreign immigration totalled about 630,000 or just over 1per cent of our record population of 60 million.

The only two previous significant waves of foreign immigration in the past 1,000 years - the Huguenots and Jews - each amounted to less than 1 per cent spread over up to 50 years. So the inflow now is some 25 times any previous level.

Such numbers are, of course, having a huge impact on our society. The growth of our minority ethnic communities illustrates the point.

By no means all of them are immigrants, since about half were born and brought up here and are as British as anyone else.

But their parents and grandparents were immigrants, so their numbers are some measure of the impact of immigration on our society over the past halfcentury.

In 1951, ethnic minorities were 1per cent of our population. They are now 8 per cent. And in state secondary schools they number 17 per cent.

To these, of course, should be added immigrants who are not part of the black and minority ethnic communities - notably, in recent years, the Poles.

Meanwhile, in Greater London one child in two is born to a foreign mother and in several of our cities, the indigenous community will find themselves a minority before very long.

Small wonder that there is widespread public concern, that two-thirds of us feel our culture is under threat, and that 83 per cent want firm action from the Government.

Why is it, then, that the Government is deliberately perpetuating the ridiculous myth that we are "a nation of immigrants"? Its track record should tell us the answer: if you can't solve a problem, spin it.

What has happened - quite simply, indeed undeniably - is that the Government has lost control of our borders. Ministers have no idea who has come, who has gone and who is still here. They were far too slow to tackle the asylum mess which they inherited from the Conservatives.

Then they deliberately and, in my view, crazily made a massive increase in work permits followed by an appalling miscalculation over the likely inflows from Eastern Europe.

So, prevented by political correctness from addressing the root of the problem - which is the scale of immigration - they reached for the spin.

We were repeatedly told that none of this mattered because we are a nation of immigrants anyway - a nation that has successfully absorbed immigration down the centuries. That line has been shot to pieces by Professor Conway.

The Government is now left with its second defence - that all this immigration is beneficial, even necessary, for our economy. Two-thirds of the public do not believe this, but the Government continues to repeat it. The public are, of course, right.

Nearly all the benefit of immigration goes to the immigrants themselves - which, naturally, is why they come.

The Government claims that the entire country benefits from the growth in our economy as a result of immigration, but calculations based on its own figures show that the value of this growth to each member of the indigenous community comes to less than 50p a week.

Not a lot, you may think, when you consider the added cost to the economy caused by current levels of immigration - cost in the form of extra pressure on public services and infrastructure.

Indeed, the latest figures issued by the Government itself show that we shall need to build 200 houses a day, every day, for the next 20 years just to house new immigrants - not existing immigrants, but new ones. This takes no account of the illegal immigrants, who must number at least half a million.

Fortunately, the public is waking up to the situation. The chattering classes are still not too bothered. They like the cheap nannies, cheaper restaurants and lower inflation that the lower wages of immigrants bring.

But for the working class that means less money and less job security. They are not amused. Indeed, the white working class who are the most directly affected by mass immigration are beginning to desert Labour in droves.

This may be why the Government is at last taking action. Liam Byrne, Barbara Roche's successor as Minister for Immigration, admitted this week that the country is "deeply unsettled" by the present massive levels of immigration.

Only last month, and just in time for the local elections, the Home Office issued two documents setting out how it intends to restore control of our borders, with better records of arrivals and departures, new visa controls, ID cards for resident foreigners and new measures against employers of illegal workers.

This is all sensible stuff and long overdue - but whether the Home Office has staff of sufficient quality and the resources necessary to achieve their aims remains to be seen.

The truth is that we cannot continue as we are. Migrants are now arriving at very nearly one every minute. We cannot possibly integrate people into our society at such a pace, and we should not be expected to do so. Political correctness must be put aside.

There must be a sharp reduction in immigration. The public must be reassured by clear evidence that the situation is no longer spinning out of control.

The best objective would be to reduce foreign immigration to the same level as the number of British people emigrating each year. This has doubled under the present Government to about 100,000 a year.

Such a limit would allow room for those who are really essential to our economy, as well as leaving room for family reunion (under tightened rules).

Genuine refugees should not, as a matter of principle, be capped. In any case, they nowadays number fewer than 10,000 a year.

Firm and effective action is the only way forward. Spin has had its day. And Professor Conway has made a valuable contribution to its demise.

• A Nation Of Immigrants? by David Conway is available from Civitas, £10 including p&p, --.

Sir Andrew Green is chairman of MigrationWatch and former Ambassador to Saudi Arabia and Syria.


dailymail.co.uk

It's the same story throughout the West. The Left has seized the agenda and in areas like immigration has declared: We're all immigrants! Open the doors!
Just this week in Toronto we had a group of parents winning with the Board. Now the jurisdiction has adopted a Don't Tell policy concerning the children of illegals in its schools. Looks like taxpayers are being told to keep their mouths shut. And do what they're supposed to do - pay the bills. It is an amazing story of duplicity and stupidity. And it will become bolder and continue.

and then the world will fall down around our ears and we'll all die in agony and bhurkas

I find I don't have too much sympathy for the Brits on this one. They certainly didn't care to respect the native culture they found when they went abroad...

Read the Economist Magazine on the subject of immigration folks. Hardly a left-wing piffle sheet, it says one of the reasons Canada's long-term economic health looks better than many western nations is precisely because of our relatively liberal immigration policies.

Now why do they say this?

Because native-born Canadians are not having nearly enough babies, just like in most other western nations, and if we didn't have immigration, our population would skew older and older, skyrocketing costs for pension plans and health care, with too few young people to support those programs, and the economy would stall, because 60 year-olds typically do not take out mortgages for new homes.

Immigrants tend to be young, are better educated (on average) than the average Canadian, work harder, save more, and have more babies that are more likely to go to post-secondary schools than native-born Canadians.

Notice that the Fraser Institute is not calling for curbs to immigration. They want deportation to be faster and stricter, sure, but that is a law and order issue more than an immigration one.

Pangloss

Oh goody...another immigrant bashing thread....yeahhhh. Yes, those horrible people from other countries are out to get us. Funny, here in Canada, no one seems to complain about, say, immigrants from the US, or europe...just those brown ones. If they don't stick out in a crowd, there doesn't seem to be anything to complain about.

I do not see anything wrong with immigration. I do not see anything wrong with multiculturalism. I do not see anything wrong with diversity. I don't get what all the fuss is about. If you have a problem with crime...you have a problem with CRIME...don't paint a whole ethnic group in a bad light over it...face the issue of CRIME, and it's roots.

Huzzah! Another voice of reason!

Pangloss

Interestingly, the Globe had yet another article yesterday on Toronto's crime problem and its strong Jamaican roots. Roots barely three decades old and thriving. And we still have naysayers out there, Howdy Doody hats in hand, saying "Everthing is just fine, thank you..."
We've prospered from immigration but we've also gone at it foolishly. Ethnic silos are developing quickly in major areas like Toronto and we've allowed multiculturalism and diversity to trump unity. Canada must set a higher priority on integrating immigrants. The common argument expressed here and elsewhere - everything is going to work out all right - isn't good enough. For starters, we can push harder for a public debate on reasonable accommodation. It's overdue.

Yes...forced intergration...forcing people to be someone or something...ahhh, that's rational...tyranny and facism...that always helps to squash crime.

And, definitly, no whites kill eachother in TO...ohhhh, no....never...uh uh....

More nonsense. More tripe.
The Jamaican issue in Toronto is longstanding. It's been covered over and over by the Globe. As far as that island is concerned, we've had more than our share of immigration nightmares. Canadians expect better of their immigration ministry.
And all we get are "tyranny' and 'fascism" charges from the nutters.

Speaking of nonsene and trip....

So, you don't feel that any jamacians have done anything good for the community?

Hey...what is your background? Where are your roots? It seems to me that everyone from YOUR country of origin must be RACIST!

...nutter...

I said "nutter" first. Get your own!
Police sources in Toronto continue to estimate fully 85% of the city's violent crime has a Jamaican connection and you're not concerned? You're going to sit there on your high horse, foam at the mouth and call everyone a racist who disputes your garbage? Get the hell off that horse, read the Toronto dailies and start to make sense.

I don't believe that integration is forcing people to be something they are not. I believe integration is people working and socializing together. Why come to another country to segregate yourself?

I take issue with the highlighted statement, as it applied to the US. Since I live in the one of 3 heavy immigrant states and have seen and dealt with this myself for a very long time, I can assure you that:

Immigrants ten to be younger (girls marry at 14), much less educated if they even speak English, work harder at piddly-ass jobs for less money, proportionally have a higher crime rate, and they do have more babies that are LESS like to finish high school. PERIOD.

Honey, it's quality not quantity. More sows' ears or more silk purses?

Uncle

He's talking about legal immigrants I assume. My immigration wouldn't have been allowed had I not had skills and education that the US needed.

I for one WANT our population to drop from lack of babies and immigration.
While our current pension scheme would fall apart..what do you expect of a pyramid scheme? it can't go on forever even if you brought in legions of clones. Best figure out a new plan when its still a small pyramid.

good luck with that. you live in one of the most underpopulated countries in teh world. Canada can support a lot more people than it does.

is there any reason it SHOULD support a larger population? Currently the more of our own population we support, the fewer population of non self sufficient countries are supported.
There is no reason we need more people.

care to check your facts and firgures Tracy?.

No North or South American country has the right to slate Britain for it's foreign policies...let alone the US....or maybe we sould ask a native american, because you sure as hell didnt say "oh, Hello, were' colonising your land, you wouldnt mind awfully if you move would you?" - how do North Americans sleep at night slateing the British for this?

"We HATE colonialism" ha dont make me laugh, Colonialism is ALL NORTH America is about....period and it is hypocrytical to cast Britain in a bad light for this.

no reason it should, but there's an awful lot of people who will want to come here and to stop them is selfish, maybe? I'm not sure

I think you will find that more people "intergrate" than you might realize. I taught english as a second language to new comers to edmonton, and MAN, those people were dedicated to learning the language, so excited about the culture, and so proud to be part of Canada.

But, what I am talking about is forcing people to intergrate. It's one thing to intergrate, forced intergration is another thing. But, just as plenty of white folks like to hole themselves up in suburbs and little fancy gated communities and try to keep ethnic folks out, it only makes sense that people from various countries and cultures would congregate.

And...part of intergration...is acceptance. If you aren't going to accept people until they turn white, speak english perfectly and abondon anything to do with their culture, guess what, they aren't going to be too eager to intergrate (I think I keep spelling intergrate wrong...dang!). So, it's a two way street.

It would be quite selfish on our part.
Of course im also the first to admit to emigrating for a better life is quite selfish. It means rather than make the world around you better you just pack up and flee to wherever the grass is greener at the moment.

absolutely. So you can hardly blame people for coming here, and you can hardly complain when they do. Everyone deserves a chance at a good life, and if they feel they're more likely to get one in another place, why shouldn't they go there?

Of course it's only polite to bring something useful with you, like skills, money, knowledge, that kind of thing....

Well, clearly some peoples ideas of integration may go to far but if a certain segment of immigrants has trouble integrating we must ask what is the problem at what should we do.

I think I offered the answer...create an atmosphere in which people would like to integrate in.

Not everyone who comes to Canada is going to be able to integrate...or be willing to let go. Some people don't come to Canada because they necessarily want to come to Canada, some come because if they don't, they will most likely be killed in their home country. They love their culture, they love their home...but they cannot go back. But, really, I believe that most who come to Canada really do try, in one way or another, to belong. But at the same time, I think it is a difficult balancing act...attempting to preserve ones own roots, while adapting to a new society...that is a challenge. I'm concerned because I will soon be moving to Turkey. How will I make out? I do not know the language. I do not have a grasp of the culture. I will be an outsider in a foreign land. No matter how hard I try, I have a suspicion that people will STILL look at me as an outsider and be saying much what you folks are saying...that I am not integrating. Well...it takes time...it takes support...it takes money sometimes...education doesn't come cheap! So, I hope that people have patience with me, and at least try to understand. And, even though I am moving there, I still see myself as a Canadian...which I don't see anything wrong with. I am not about to abandon who I am...who I have been. But, I wish to combine who I have been with who I will be while I am there...combine what I already know with what I hope to know in the future...in the strange, new, exotic land that I will be finding myself in.

I think as well, alot of people assume alot of things. I think of some who I have met that have come from war torn countries...and it has scarred them. It has spawned mental illness, paranoia, fear, difficulties adapting socially. The next time you see someone and you say "Hey, they aren't integrating the way I want them to!", consider what their past may have been, and the challenges they may face in coming into a new society...after a horror filled passed.

And the last point I will make is this. A friend of my wife and I's...mine..whatever...she is from pakistan. She is a wonderful person. When she first moved to Edmonton, she knew little english. She had only been here a few weeks when she was at a bus stop and a young man started being a real dick to her because she did not speak english and was wearing a headscarf. He didn't even bother to find out anything...he just assumed...or was a racist...or whatever. She has learned english, and speaks it well, she is proud to be part of Canada, she tries to take in as many events as possible to feel as though she belongs. She was so happy to be invited to our wedding because it would be the first time she would be part of a Canadian wedding...and that was very exciting to her. If she was given a chance by the first dick, she would have proven that she is a wonderful, openminded person who has tried very hard to fit in...but...he didn't. How many others in here are doing the same thing to people they see on the streets...or their neighbours...or whomever?

Dude:

Preface: I care very little about the U.S. immigration experience: it was not what I was writing about. As this is the "Canadian Content Community," I was speaking to the facts on the ground as they pertain to Canada.

Your experience means nothing as compared to actual hard facts compiled by Census Canada. The lesbian who lives next door to me is left handed: should I then conclude that all lesbians are left handed?

Arguing world views based upon your own experience and your own experience alone is narcissistic. Therefore prone to failure.

So unless you are a demographer who can show me the flaws in StatsCan's methodology, I doubt very much that you ". . .can assure me that. . ." anything at all. I choose to have more faith in the reports put out by the Pacific Coast Group For Policy Alternatives, The Fraser Institute, and the Carnegie Foundation: a leftie, a rightie, and a centrist, respectively.

You do indeed have the right to your own opinions, but alas, not your own facts.

Pangloss

When someone immigrated to another country they need to understand that what was their norm at home their new country is different. Everyone has a right to practice their beliefs in the privacy of their own homes. But in their everyday life here they must conform to the ways of their new country. The majority do but we never of them, the only ones we read and hear about are those who resist integration. If we moved to their countries we sure as h*** have to integrate of suffer the consequences.
Immigration sure be closely scrutinized. It is not the quantity that counts but the quality.

Well, first off I'm not American, but either way, the Brits obviously were the ones who first started converting the natives weren't they? The savages in Canada were being dealt with pretty harshly before Canada was even a country of its own. That's sort of off topic imo anyways. I'm not saying we didn't do those things, that's not what the article was about. I say the same things when Canadians whine about immigration.

I was speaking about more recent British immigrants. When I travel overseas to countries that weren't part of the British Empire, I don't see Brits adopting the local culture, dress, language, customs, etc. If anything they seem to get more British. They have their British social club, hang out in a British pub, open a UK cultural center, often don't bother to even learn the language... When I lived in the Czech Rep. the most one Brit could say in Czech was "Another glass of wine please". My roomate here is English, but she's lived in Kenya and India as well. Her only Kenyan and Indian contacts were her maids. She certainly never adopted their cultural norms. Can you imagine how any woman from our culture would react if we had to become subservient to our husbands should we move to India? We'd say how we act at home is our business. The same goes for them.

Well, you got to learn the essential phrases first. I kind of see your point though. To be fair to the Brits, they accept more immigrants per Capita then the Czechs.
--

I agree.