Do we really know what voters think about immigration?

Before the General Election, Ipsos MORI found immigration to be the forth most important issue concerning voters. In March YouGov found Labour was perceived as the worst major party on dealing with the issue of immigration...

Our Guest Writer is Zaki Nahaboo, who works on the Demos Open Left project www.openleft.co.uk

Immigration has been one of the dominant issues in the first month of the Labour leadership election. The Mrs Duffy incident has been seized on by Ed Balls as a moment that summed up Labour’s disconnection from their own voters. Before the General Election, Ipsos MORI found immigration to be the forth most important issue concerning voters. In March YouGov found Labour was perceived as the worst major party on dealing with the issue of immigration.

Diane Abbot has been consistent during the early hustings in arguing that immigration is a proxy for voters concerns about inequality and class. The proxy argument is persuasive, but polling suggests attitudes towards immigration are also bound to cultural perceptions.

Way back in December 2004 YouGov conducted a poll investigating perceptions about immigration. This poll asked about the non-economic dimension to immigration issues and asked questions on attitudes towards ethnic groups, while also taking into account social class.

The 2004 data showed that 25% would think their community would ‘disapprove’ if more Polish people came to live there. With the exception of Australians (on 6%), all other ethnic groups had much higher rates of disapproval than the Polish category. Those who would experience the highest rates of disapproval were considered to be Iraqis (64%) and Pakistanis (58%). We cannot attribute difference in disapproval rates to simply direct economic concerns (such as social housing or job security). Social class made little impact on the differentiated attitudes towards ethnic groups, as the range between ABC1 and C2DE groups reached its highest at 6%. The world has moved on since 2004 and concern about Eastern European migration and strains on public services in Britain has risen. However what the YouGov 2004 Poll highlights is the importance of non-economic factors determining attitudes to immigration.

The Mrs Duffy question highlighted the paucity of Labour’s listening skills; but the issue cannot be solved by purely centring on the direct economic impact of immigration upon livelihood. Tinkering with the points-based system will not appease voters as immigration is bound up with numerous other issues. The cultural issues are much harder to address, but the Left does need to acknowledge that perceptions of immigration are bound up with issues over the provision of public services.

As Rushanara Ali argued in a Demos report, losing touch with the public once in Government is the bane of any party, particularly one with a long history of struggling on behalf of the marginalised and vulnerable. The issue of immigration provides an opportunity to re-engage the lost voters, strengthening Labour’s commitment to social justice and constructing Labour as a movement with grassroots concern. Here candidates would do well to continue exploring immigration as a proxy for issues which cause resentment such as quality of care homes, social housing and job security. Yet for Labour to abide by the principles it seeks to reconnect with, it must be more than a party that seeks to satisfy public opinion on immigration at the expense of compromising on social justice and internationalism.

15 Responses to “Do we really know what voters think about immigration?”

  1. Liz McShane

    Tracy – p.s. if you can’t make your points without having to resort to gratuitous, offensive comments then it’s rather sad really.

  2. Michael Burke

    Zaki,

    a useful and ineresting piece.

    Have you seen research from Stan Greenberg? Think you’ll find it intersting.

    http://www.greenbergresearch.com/index.php?ID=2445

    He shows that there was a group who ‘consdered voting Labour’, 8% of all voters, but didn’t who were *less* hostile to immigration than Labour voters (or LibDems).

    Also, Labour did badly in terms of its values representing voters values on immigration, just 22%. But this was not because they wanted a more restrictive policy- the Toris only scored on this issue in line with thei actual vote. Immigration was the only issue on which the LibDems outscored Labour, at 23%, and they had a policy of an amnesty for long-standing failed asylum-seekers.

  3. tracy j

    Liz. get off your high horse. fascism and socialism are from the same place. and your comments about terrorists and conservatives on the other thread were disgraceful.

  4. David Jones

    tracy j, learn some history – you’re being daft!

Comments are closed.