UK Immigration From The EU

There is further anxiety today because reports indicate that the UK authorities have a huge backlog of unresolved immigration files, and worse have entirely lost track of tens of thousands of people refused entry but perhaps  still here. The usual demands for this that and the other to be done are all over the media. This blog takes a different view and in so doing it is out of tune with majority public opinion in the UK. If you are a member of a club you have to stick to all the rules and you cannot stick to some and avoid others. If you do not like the rules you should not be a member.

The political, cultural and economic benefits of being part of the EU are enormous, but they will only accrue the full measure of  advantage if Britain embraces the whole project hook, line and sinker, including the free movement of citizens of the EU to move from one country to another. There has to be a change in the way we see our relationship. We must see ourselves as insiders, with all the other member states, looking out, not outsiders looking in, as we do now. We would then see that issues of communities being allegedly ‘swamped’, benefit tourism, housing shortages, overstretched services, education and language difficulties, cultural and religious tensions and all the other things complained of are not the fault of outside interference from Brussels. They are instead due to years, even decades of economic and social mismanagement from London.

There is no point in trying to tinker with EU rules through negotiations, nor having tantrums about sudden bills which we forgot were coming, nor blaming unemployment on the Poles. We either knuckle down in good humour and stay or we have the courage of our convictions and go. If we choose to go there is  just one more question to answer.

Where to?

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