80 per cent of the people arriving in the UK over the last year for work had a visa tied to a job to start when they got here
For years, immigration has consistently ranked among the top concerns in surveys of the British public. In response, political leaders have repeatedly made efforts to show that they can bring it under control.
During the last election, the Conservative Party reiterated its ‘ambition’ to reduce net migration to the tens of thousands and it has since made attempts to make the UK a less appealing destination for migrants by reducing their access to health, welfare or education services.
And yet the views expressed in public opinion surveys are often based on misinformation and false assumptions. This matters because it restricts the available space for envisioning and debating different approaches to the issue.
For over 15 years, a majority of respondents to public opinion surveys from Ipsos Mori have considered there to be ‘too many immigrants’. Yet the same organisation has also found that on average people also over-estimate the amount of migrants that there are in the country by double.
Similarly, the British Social Attitudes survey from 2013 found that a majority of the British population considered that the costs of EU and non-EU workers outweighed the benefits. In contrast, research has found that between 2000 and 2011 immigrants have made a net contribution to the country’s finances, paying in more in taxes than they use in services and benefits.
A further range of myths, such as that there is a vastly greater number of asylum seekers in the UK than is the case, is addressed in the latest publication from Class and Migrants Rights Network, Changing the debate on migration.
However, the problem is not just that people don’t know the facts: it is that they don’t trust political leaders to tell them the truth. Policies that are based on being tough and in control, such as setting targets, have failed. As a result, the British public has been consistently dissatisfied with the way its governments have tried to deal with immigration.
The Conservatives and Liberal Democrats suffered from declining public confidence on the issue and polling after their term in government has found half the population to consider immigration to still be the most important issue facing the country today. Attempts to be tough and in control have neither reduced immigration levels nor raised public confidence in our political leaders.
In a global era, international migration is an inescapable reality. Furthermore, migration, particularly between parts of the world with long-established historical connections, cannot be easily switched on or off.
For this reason immigration policies often fail at meeting their declared objectives. But that is not to say that immigration is out of control. For example, the latest migration statistics showed that of the people arriving in the UK over the last year for work, 80 per cent were arriving with a visa tied to a job to start when they got here.
Over the last parliament, the slight decline and more recent rise of net migration to Britain could be more easily explained by the national economy and availability of jobs than by government efforts to manage the phenomenon. As noted by Philip Legrain, those who arrive often do the jobs that locals don’t want, or start their own businesses which contribute further to the economy.
At the moment, false assumptions and distrust mean that few public figures openly consider what our country might look like without an overbearing focus on being tough and getting the numbers down. A constructive debate need not push for open borders, but at least should provide a chance to imagine the pros and cons of alternative ways of living with migration.
Simon McMahon is a research fellow at Coventry University
To download a copy of the pamphlet by Class and the Migrants Rights Network, click here
34 Responses to “Too often public opinion about migration is based on false information”
madasafish
Bollocks?
“Mass migration is driving down the wages being offered to British jobseekers, a major report by the Bank of England has found.
Economists at the Bank found that increases in immigration have reduced the pay on offer to care workers, waiting staff, and cleaners, as the competition for these jobs has risen.”
http://tinyurl.com/nauo8hl
YOU are the one talking spherical objects based on prejudice.
David McKendrick
http://blogs.lse.ac.uk/politicsandpolicy/fears-about-adverse-consequences-of-rising-immigration-have-not-materialised/
Empirical research on the labour market effects of immigration to the
UK finds little overall adverse impact on wages and employment for the
UK-born. The empirical evidence shows that:
Immigrants and native-born workers are not close substitutes on
average (existing migrants are closer substitutes for new migrants).
This means that UK-born workers are, on average, cushioned from rises in supply caused by immigration.
The less skilled are closer substitutes for immigrants than the more
highly skilled. So any pressures from increased competition for jobs is
more likely to be found among less skilled workers. But these effects are small.
There is no evidence that EU migrants affect the labour market performance of native-born workers.
David McKendrick
What do you want? Dancing round a maypole or Morris dancing?
In Scotland our native culture seems to have been preserved – highland dancing, tartan, bagpipes etc but I don’t know what culture you would expect to be distinctive of London? Not only does London not have a distinctive culture any more but it has never had a British culture since the Romans created London over 2000 years ago.
Sky Pixie
This article is designed to mislead. EU migrants are cost beneficial, non-Eu cost money mostly due to low work-place participation see http://www.migrationwatch.org for the facts then judge for yourself
jj
I think you know what I’m saying. London has changed at such a fast pace this past 70 years, so so fast, end of the stability (relative) that we have been seeing before the start of slum clearances, it has caused fractured communities, I should know, my family has seen Woolwich change into a rather ominous part of London, where it used to be a safe community.