Yet again I don’t get it! 18-30 year olds are what we want, especially in construction and care, etc. They are not going to come to sign on! Net migration between us and the EU is negative. Europeans have a similar culture and history to ourselves and thus integrate better? Most who come have excellent English and qualifications. And most want to return home when they have made some savings. What is there not to like? The EU also wants UK fees applied to EU citizens at UK Universities – makes absolute sense if reciprocal. Also can we have the E111 back?
Die hard Brexiteers are, what ever they tell you, not concerned about taking back control (that is just a convenient argument that has not been vilified like their racism). They are never going to vote Labour again whilst there is a party for bigots available. So basically Keir – just ignore the fuckers. On control – we have seen with water companies who has actual control – foreign investors, who own 57.7% of UK listed companies. Whether we like it or not – we live in a globalised world. Trump is finding this out as he roles back his absurd tariffs. So the taking back control bit was giving even more power to the multinationals – at least the EU was prepared to take them on.
Research by the Centre for European Reform suggests the UK economy is 2.5% smaller than it would have been if Remain had won the referendum. Public finances fell by £26 billion a year. This amounts to £500 million a week and is growing.
Lastly the positives about the EU. A few years back and Spain was a dictatorship and relatively poor – migrants from Spain came to the UK (Fawlty Towers!), – now Spain is a democracy and migration is the other way. Eastern Europe may be more difficult due to the ingrained autocracy of its history – but recent signs are good with Poland and Romania both showing a strong central path.
With migration there are push and pull factors both from the home and the destination. I would maintain that the pull factor for staying at home is the greatest by a long way. So the push factor has to be immense – persecution or environmental disaster (starvation), whilst pull factors such as economics and safety, freedom are secondary. Why is no analysis done on this? Oh and I have wrongly omitted love! Perhaps the strongest factor of all!
But really to leave your home environs and family, friends must take a special type of person. Or lack of options? The end result of my random thoughts are that if we increased the flow of wealth from the rich to the poor we would have no migration crisis or problem!