Immigration: Sustainable solutions are within our grasp!

 

In my January column, I outlined what is wrong with this country’s immigration system when judged against core libertarian principles. 

In short, the system lacked democratic consent, was incoherent & muddled, and was riddled with gimmicky short-termism. 

No wonder it has been an issue of concern for the British people and the country’s political parties over many decades. 

In this article, I want to suggest some solutions based on those much-maligned principles: pragmatism and vested self-interest. 

Firstly, illegal migration, including those entering the country and claiming asylum. The current system is out-of-date and one big bureaucratic go-slow, marked by huge backlogs in both asylum applications and appeals. 

The Rwanda Plan is a joke: costing the Government by bleeding away its remaining political capital for a costly project that will have minimal impact on removing failed asylum seekers. 

The Government has also misdirected its efforts by speeding up the woeful asylum backlog, currently standing at 80,000 people. But this involves a further extension of the state through the hiring of yet more petty functionaries at the Home Office. In any case, the real issue lies further down the process. 

It is at the appeals backlog where those whose applications have been turned down, sit around, in either detention centres or hotels, for an average of 82 weeks, nearly 20 months, because of a shortage of legal aid lawyers. This quiet work-to-rule is probably an attempt at political defiance, reflecting much of the legal profession’s own agenda – in the face of the Government’s democratic mandate. 

So, as a pragmatic one-off, I’d like to see extra funds released to lubricate the legal process and a robust approach thereafter taken to removing those illegally here, back to their countries of origin. 

I’d also like to remove the nonsense of asylum seekers not being allowed to work whilst their claims are processed. However, before you shout me down, I’m not advocating a full right to work visa giveaway! Looking at the shambles of the ‘public realm’ in Suffolk, shows us that there is work to be done and the asylum seekers, with appropriate supervision, should be tasked to help do it. 

We should also be far less squeamish about the Royal Navy and Border Force  intercepting the small boats and turning them back to French waters – France, after all,  being a safe country for asylum applications. And if this means we are in a technical breach of the European Court of Human Rights – so be it, we should leave it, and ignore the howls of protest from the lefty lawyers and human rights activists.

And perhaps, given the understandable desire of people to seek a better standard of living in this country, there should be an effort to incentivise UK businesses to invest in operations in those countries, and of the Government itself to take a lead in peacekeeping operations where conflict is the major reason people flee.  

Ironically though, the impact of illegal migration is nothing compared to the unsustainable volumes of those arriving and staying here through legitimate channels. 

The annual net increase in those living here amounts to over 1% of the population: some 750,000 additional people! The sheer number is impacting on the availability and cost of housing and public services, in some cases leading to individual misery and social tensions. 

I’d advocate a number of measures to slow down – and eventually reverse - this unsustainable surge in numbers. 

My underlying principle – over the longer term – is ‘one in, one out’, albeit allowing for short- and medium-term variations depending on national need. Such a disciplined approach needs to be carefully and accurately monitored – something the current Home Office seems incapable of. 

How could we go about this? 

Firstly, we must tighten the criteria by which workers are able to bring over immediate family members and other dependants, including the period before which such requests can be lodged. Even then, preference should always be given to those working in strategically important sectors facing acute labour shortages. 

There should never be a presumptive right to bring over family members. This is true for other countries, so why not the UK? 

Next, there should be no automatic right for first degree students, who having completed their courses, to remain here. Period. It should be incumbent upon their places of education to ensure that they fulfil their visa requirements and leave the country. Universities and the like should face massive fines if ‘their’ students don’t return home. 

Obviously, if these graduates wish to apply from their home countries to return here, either before they return home or subsequently, to continue their studies or take-up full-time suitable/approved employment,  then all well and good, subject to the required criteria?

Finally, this approach should be the catalyst to address one of this country’s greatest own goals: the 5.5m people of working age who are on out-of-work benefits but are not technically unemployed. 

Research by the Learning & Research Institute suggests that had the UK the same level of employment rates as a basket of high performing countries, then our workforce would be 1.2m bigger than at present – dwarfing the current vacancy rate of 930,000. 

The same report showed that the lowest economic activity rates were to be found among those with disabilities and among lone parents. 

This country has it in its gift to provide much better policies aimed at helping employers make the adjustments needed to encourage those with disabilities into work. The Department for work & Pensions seems to be especially dozy in this regard: apparently, just 1 in 10 out of work disabled people get support to find work each year. Perhaps the private sector should take over responsibility? 

Equally, investment in improving access to inexpensive but good childcare is essential in encouraging single parents or guardians to return to the workplace. The alternative might be to  increase tax thresholds for such returnees (and for every worker come to that).

In short, we need a smarter and smaller migration intake. The most sustainable solutions are already within our grasp.

First published in the www.suffolkfreepress.co.uk on Friday, February 2, 2024.

Tokenistic measures fall short in tackling immigration crisis!

Nowadays, the mere mention of the word triggers some of the most visceral conversations around. Whether it be exchanges in the Houses of Parliament, in living rooms and in pubs, or smeared across every social media platform imaginable, this is one of the most fiercely contested issues of our age.

And why shouldn’t it be, given the vast numbers involved?

According to the Office for National Statistics (ONS), 745,000 more people arrived in our country than left in 2022. That is an increase of more than 1% of our population in just 12 months.

Whilst most are here legally, many are not. Just over 52,000 were detected illegally entering the UK in the 12 months to June 2023, although this is likely to be a significant undercount, by the very nature of the matter. At least 40,000 of these claimed to be asylum seekers.

Research from the Migration Observatory during 2023 shows that whilst the UK is almost evenly split as to whether immigration is a good thing (31%) or a bad thing (33%), well over half are looking for a reduction in the numbers arriving here.

This is a debate which I intend to address, if not with both feet, then across my next two columns for this newspaper.

In this article, I want to set out a number of general principles and observations. In February, I hope to offer some solutions. All from a libertarian perspective.

As a philosophy, libertarianism is suspicious of too much power being controlled by the state over the rights of individuals, families and communities. Most of us have grown up at times when the ever-encroaching interference from the state is almost taken for granted. ‘The state must do this, and the state must do that’, we say – heedless that the state, with its millions of employees and vested interests, operates to justify its own power and influence.

However, one of the few legitimate roles of the state is to protect its citizens from external harm, whether that be from military, economic, or migratory threats.

I accept that not all libertarians would agree with this. Some theorists, rather like the ultra left-wing demonstrators one sometimes sees or hears on demonstrations, advocate for completely open borders.

Most of us, though, whilst we would never advocate restrictions on people leaving this country, do feel that there must be a rationale for inward migration that is underpinned by our own economic and social self-interest.

Whether it be short-term to fill essential vacancies that the millions of our current citizens of working age choose not to fill (more on that conundrum in February), or in the longer-term to take advantage of overseas expertise to reap the benefits from new technologies, there needs to be a clearly articulated agreement between the governed and the governing as to this rationale. Unlike at present.

Tony Blair turned on the taps of mass migration in the early years of this century without any electoral mandate. Now, the present Conservative administration has facilitated another shift - again without any strategic approach or national consent.

As a libertarian, I have absolutely no time for anti-migration arguments based, explicitly or implicitly, on racial or cultural hatred. I abhor the dog whistling politics that seems to have even reached Suffolk in recent years. We need to have an objective system that evaluates what this country needs and ensures that we can access the right people irrespective of their origins.

But equally, we shouldn’t let the usual shrill leftie types get away with branding efforts to reduce overall immigration and refine precisely who comes here as particularly draconian.

For migration is an international phenomenon, propelling millions of people from the mainly global south towards ostensibly richer nations in the northern hemisphere.

A few examples will suffice. Last month, the French National Assembly passed legislation to make it more difficult for migrants to bring family members to France and delay their access to welfare benefits.

The Greek government has opted to simply deport undocumented migrants arriving across its archipelagos.

And famously, ex- and quite possibly future-US president Trump continues to focus on staunching the flows of illegal migrants across the Mexican border.

An international situation demands more of a joined up international response where appropriate, adapted to suit particular national situations.

This means taking a whole system approach, as opposed to Rishi Sunak's panic-stricken and tokenistic measures. The Rwanda scheme is a case in point. Rather than expending both taxpayers' money and political capital on an expensive scheme that even if it goes ahead will have a marginal deterrent effect at most, efforts should be focussed on speeding up the process whereby illegals without valid asylum claims are identified and deported.

The costs of this particular policy failure are eye-watering at every level. Since, 2022 the UK has handed over - or has pledged to so do - well over £320m for a scheme that may never happen or, if it does, is likely to account for a few hundred illegal migrants.

To properly 'take control' of our borders, we need both public consent and a long-term plan. More on what that could look like in February.

First published www.suffolkfreepress.co.uk on Thursday, January 4, 2024.