MigrationWatch is more interested in scaremongering than getting the facts right.
MigrationWatch has published a paper by its leader Sir Andrew Green which says that Britain should remove the ‘pull‘ for new immigrants.
When he speaks of the ‘pull’, he is referring to the UK’s minimum wage and the benefits available here which are worth up to five times more than those in Romania and Bulgaria.
MigrationWatch has a long and illustrious history of skewed data about immigrants.
For the most part, their anti-immigration sentiment flows from two categories: economic concerns, where it is claimed immigrants have a detrimental impact on employment, and social issues, or in other words, losing our ‘Britishness’.
I will focus on the former.
The National Institute of Economic and Social Research has recently shown through statistical evidence that, specifically during a recession or low growth period, net immigration has little or no impact on unemployment in the host country.
This may be because most migrants move to a country for a specific reason, rather than just for the sake of it. They may already have a job, are willing to take up lower paid work, or indeed they may be students who tend to be self-supporting.
For the most part, people do not make huge life changing decisions, such as moving to a new country, on a whim.
As MigrantWatch has pointed out, 26 million Bulgarians and Romanians will be able to move to the UK from January 1st 2014. Forgetting the other 26 EU states they could go to, and assuming that the entire population of Bulgaria and Romania decide to up sticks and come here, they are technically correct.
What MigrationWatch forgets, however, is that the citizens of both countries have been free to come to the UK to live for the past six years. The only restrictions have been on the labour markets.
Additionally, MigrantWatch and its affiliates are concerned that the EU will allow Romanians to come over to the UK and claim benefits rather than work.
The stats, however, don’t back this up.
In the 2010/11 fiscal year, 5.5 million out of the 38 million UK working age population claimed work related benefits, including Jobseekers Allowance, Income Support and the like.
Of these, 371,000 were non-UK nationals, a quarter of whom were from other EU countries.
Therefore, out of the 2.2 million EU nationals in the UK in 2010, 4.21% claimed working benefits. By contrast, 14.32% of British nationals within the age range were doing the same.
The difference is staggering, and coupled with the above NIESR report, shows that migrants don’t come for the benefits, nor do they ‘steal jobs’, as some believe.
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15 Responses to “MigrationWatch is scaremongering, as usual”
Newsbot9
That’s right, he has to eliminate basic workers rights, the minimum wage and general eligibility for British people to access benefits. Migrants are a smokescreen.
Old Albion
For a while there i thought you were going to let me down. But you didn’t. You eventually came out with the ‘racism’ accusation. The Left’s usual tactic to shut down debate.
I’m most certainly not trying to raise unemployment to 13M (where did you get that from) I would like to see unemployment at zero. I suppose you have assumed i’m a supporter of the Conservative/ Liberal coalition. Wrong again, i will never again vote for the lying, thieving, scandal concealing parties, the Lib/Lab/Con.
‘The Labour party the party of the people’…………….laughable.
In a message dated 26/02/2013 23:51:16 GMT Standard Time, notifications@disqus.net writes:
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Newsbot9 wrote, in response to Old Albion:
Yes, it “causes” damage by creating the sort of racist and bigoted attacks on this country which you are causing. This isn’t a reason to listen to your lies, of course, You”re trying to raise unemployment to more like 13 million by collapsing the economy further – and of course, the evidence is that immigration does not, in fact, raise unemployment. As has been seen in numerous studies, in i.e. Miami.
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Newsbot9
Nope, unlike you, I’m not interested in shutting actual debate down, and I don’t deny reality. That you are a bihot and a tracist is plain,
And I see, you want universal workfare. Got it. And you’re to the right of the coalition. No surprise there.
Old Albion
A bihot and tracist ?? Are you sure you have the intellect to continue this?
I’m certainly to the right of Marxism/Communism/Stalinism and Left Foot Forward.
In a message dated 27/02/2013 21:16:40 GMT Standard Time, notifications@disqus.net writes:
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Newsbot9 wrote, in response to Old Albion:
Nope, unlike you, I’m not interested in shutting actual debate down, and I don’t deny reality. That you are a bihot and a tracist is plain,
And I see, you want universal workfare. Got it. And you’re to the right of the coalition. No surprise there.
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Newsbot9
You’re to the right of Ghengis Khan.
And of course you have to be a good little social darwinist and believe that only people with your own ideology can be intelligent. Keep running away from the truth!