Yesterday Ed Miliband made another step in reframing Labour's position on immigration. With Ukip surging in the polls and likely to come first in next year's European elections, and the media already beginning their racist attacks on Bulgarians and Romanians, Labour has a choice. They can follow the Conservatives in drifting to the right in the hope of choking off Ukip support or they can offer a positive, more progressive alternative that deals with concerns over immigration but in a wider context.
Nick Lowles is the founder of HOPE not hate
Yesterday Ed Miliband made another step in reframing Labour’s position on immigration.
Admitting Labour got it wrong in allowing too many unskilled migrants into the UK during its time in office, he also sought to focus on unscrupulous employers and lax and unenforced laws.
In this, he was trying to walk a very thin tightrope between being seen to be tough on immigration while protecting the vulnerable.
I understand what Ed was trying to do, just as I understand the difficult position he finds himself in. There are a lot of people in Britain who are nervous about immigration, the impact on their economic well-being and the changing face of the country.
Some of these people are clearly racist and will object to any non-white immigration at all. Others are not racist and their concerns have to be understood.
In 2011, HOPE not hate conducted a survey of attitudes to race, immigration and identity.
With more then 5,000 people asked over 90 questions, the Fear and HOPE report was one of the largest surveys on this issue. It found that 23 per cent of the population were bitterly opposed to immigration and multiculturalism.
It found an even bigger number, 28 per cent, were more relaxed about immigration and multiculturalism but concerned over future immigration for economic reasons. We called this group ‘Identity Ambivalents’ and it consisted of mainly Labour voters, public sector workers and the majority of Britain’s BME population.
My concern about Ed’s new video is not that he is talking about immigration or even trying to address people’s concerns, but rather that he is answering the wrong questions.
Labour now admits that too many unskilled migrants entered the country over the last ten years but could a Labour government really limit the numbers? Most of the unskilled migrants come from A8 countries so there is actually nothing Labour could have done about this.
They could have possibly blocked their arrival for another year or two, but given our membership of the EU this would only have been a temporary measure.
Ed quite rightly talks about enforcing the minimum wage and improving the rights of workers, and it is one of the huge failings of Labour in government that they created such a flexible and unregulated labour market that migrants and non-migrants alike could be exploited so easily.
But by linking improvements in working conditions so obviously to reducing immigration it both frames the debate as immigrants are a problem and undermines a wider, and much more positive, case for better conditions for all.
Our Fear and HOPE report found that economic pessimism was the key driver for fear. The less people saw a future for themselves and their children the more they resented newcomers.
This economic pessimism, reinforced with the sense that they are losers in this globalised world, quickly develops a cultural narrative and racist scapegoating emerges. It is no coincidence that the bulk of areas that saw strong BNP votes were those one-industry towns and communities which were on the decline.
Labour is never going to win an immigration debate by focusing solely on immigration and talk of numbers.
Firstly, after record numbers of immigrants during thirteen years in office they are not going to be believed.
Secondly, they end up making unachievable promises and so this will only reinforces distrust in them.
Thirdly, talking up the problem of immigration will alienate many of their own voters, including the more progressive Liberal Democrats who have switched party allegiance since 2010 and who Labour need if it is to win the next election.
Finally, and most importantly, they risk answering the wrong question.
If economic pessimism is the key driver, intertwined as it is with cultural anxieties of a changing world, then the answer is convincing the electorate that Labour can offer a better tomorrow for all the people of Britain, especially those who feel they are losing out from globalisation and deindustrialisation.
The immigration debate is going to become even more toxic over the next eighteen months.
With Ukip surging in the polls and likely to come first in next year’s European elections, and the media already beginning their racist attacks on Bulgarians and Romanians, Labour has a choice.
Do they follow the Conservatives in drifting to the right in the hope of choking off Ukip support or do they offer a positive, more progressive alternative that deals with concerns over immigration but in a much wider context than they are doing currently?
A wider context that involves a better economic future, restoring faith and trust in politicians and making democracy work for and involve people.
People in Guildford don’t vote BNP. The people in communities where hope is lost did.
29 Responses to “People in Guildford don’t vote BNP”
LB
So you think 130K is compared to 560K isn’t a fuck up?
The state is looking at screwing people over for what it does owe. e.g Raising the state retirement age – a default. CPI not RPI – a default. Raising contributions – a default
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Again, though, you haven’t proved that borrowing is always bad.
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I’ve never said that was the case. You claimed via your numbers that borrowing could be good. I’ve pointed out that you scenario doesn’t apply to the state at the moment. It’s spending and borrowing but not getting growth. The reason is that its screwing people with tax, and just using borrowing to fund spending not any investments.
An investment needs to cover the borrowing costs, either by generating more cash, or by generating more savings. Which bit of the 700 bn spend does that?
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If you don’t like the mortgage analogy.
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I do like it. Apply it to the state.
So when you buy a house, you end up with an asset. Either that produces savings in spending, no rent, or you sell it, or you rent it out generating a cashflow. Perfectly good.
Now the state owes 5,300 bn for its pensions. Of the assets it has bought, how is it going to pay the cashflows?
1. Sell the assets. Hmm whose going to buy a hospital or a school or a nuclear sub?
2. Cashflows. Which assets generate the cash flow to pay the assets? Or are you going to go down the we’re all slaves of the state route?
3.Savings. OK, what spending gets cut?
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It can live in perpetual debt providing it can cover its monthly payments
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So going forward, show that the state can cover its debts?
First you need to list the debts?
1,200 borrowing
5,300 pension
400 PFI
Nuclear decommissioning, guarantees, …
It’s above the 7,000 bn mark.
So how can it afford it?
Income 550 bn, spending 700 bn?
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Providing the growth in debt remains below the growth in the economy, the state can stay permanently in debt without a problem
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OK, prove that is the case.
2005-2010, the pensions debt went up by 736 bn a year, according to the ONS.
You’re waffling because you aren’t putting hard numbers to you’re analysis. You’re living in the same la la land as MPs as a consequence. You analysis is correct, if your conditions hold. But you haven’t checked that your conditions hold. They don’t.
eg. Debts increase at huge percentages of GDP each year. Many many times the level of growth.
So on the basis of that, they are bust.
Gareth Millward
I don’t argue with your figures which show we are in a structural deficit. I’m arguing with the idea that the way to solve it is to pull support away from poorer people.
I don’t have the figures to hand, but by the same token I’m not going to pull figures out of context to skew the debate in my favour. I concede that this can make my point weaker, but I am equally unconvinced that you are necessarily using relevant figures in your analysis too. You’ve consistently picked on areas of state expenditure which you don’t like to serve your fundamental agenda which appears to be for lower taxes for yourself on the assumption (right or wrong) that poor people are poor through their own errors and not the structural inequalities in society.
All you are showing is how the state got things wrong over the past 10 years by borrowing instead of curbing expenditure or raising taxes. I don’t really think you’ve shown how private investment would have done better. People rely on the state. It cannot fail. People who are reliant on private businesses starve when they fail if there is no backup. This is a fundamental political point.
To try and explain a little further some of the key points:
1) the United States has been in permanent debt, and has done OK over the years, I think you’ll agree.
http://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2012/11/the-long-story-of-us-debt-from-1790-to-2011-in-1-little-chart/265185/
2) You’re basic sums of £700bn debt versus £550bn income can be combated two-fold. a) Is £550bn enough to cover the interest on the debts and begin to start paying it off? In which case, economic growth over the next few years will allow us to start to breathe. And b) would raising tax revenues not make that £550bn bigger? In which case we need the economy to grow, or we need to raise taxes. Cutting spending is just ONE option, and the only one many seem to be willing to stomach. Why might that be?
3) Related to 2), if the economy isn’t growing, we have a problem. So we need some policy to get things growing again. One option is to borrow to invest. Going back to the Atlantic article, the New Deal would be an obvious example. But even if you don’t like that idea, we always have the option of spending without borrowing by getting higher tax revenues.
Then we can go back to some real fundamentals and show that unemployment and inequality are necessary and integral parts of capitalism. I’m a capitalist and can live with that; but I must also acknowledge that my relatively nice live is built upon the poverty of others. And maybe, as a collective, we should do something to address this by providing services and an infrastructure which genuinely allows those with talent to flourish. We’re all wealth creators; it’s time we all paid and were paid our fair share.
LB
1. US is irrelevant to the UK government’s mess.
2 The USD is currently the worlds reserve currency, and that enables them to do things the UK government can’t.
3. “I don’t have the figures to hand”.
Well how can you conclude anything unless you point some numbers to it?
4. “People rely on the state. It cannot fail.”
Yet another assumption. I’m stating based on the evidence of the debt numbers it will fail. You effectively saying something different, which is I hope it doesn’t fail. There’s a big difference between the two statements, and its only by ponying up the debts, all of them, and comparing it to the tax revenues that you can plainly see they will fail.
Where I expect we’re in total agreement is that consequence is dire.
5 “Your basic sums of £700bn debt versus £550bn income can be combated two-fold. a) Is £550bn enough to cover the interest on the debts and begin to start paying it off? In which case, economic growth over the next few years will allow us to start to breathe.”
No, its 7,000 bn debt. 700 is the spending.
6. And b) would raising tax revenues not make that £550bn bigger?
Depends. If you screw people out of taxes, you take money from them What effect do you think that has? You imply for poor people its low growth. I add to that. It screws the middle class and the rich. It’s these people who do make the investments. The state doesn’t.
7. “Cutting spending is just ONE option, and the only one many seem to be willing to stomach.”
There are only two options. Cutting spending. Taking more money from people.
However, as the 7,000 bn debt falls due (its back end loaded), they are going to be forced into cutting spending. That spending is pensions. Or you could say, we’re going to pay civil servants their pensions, but we’re going to axe the fire service as an example. Do you think tax payers are prepared to pay all the tax, and get no services?
LB
And maybe, as a collective, we should do something to address this by providing services and an infrastructure which genuinely allows those with talent to flourish. We’re all wealth creators; it’s time we all paid and were paid our fair share.
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Unfortunately, you’ve taken a short term view.
It’s all well and good, but if you spend other people’s retirement money, diddling them out of 430K in the process, then default on the remainder. you’ve caused a problem that is far far worse. Dire in my books,