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1
Watch any TV channel for long enough today and you will see a character with a rather patronising grin talking about careers in politics and how he definitely doesn’t want one. Nigel Farage is the leader of a party who are holding second place in the polls. There has been an escalation in hysteria on either side of the picket regarding the upcoming European elections, but rhetoric aside, what is actually at stake in the election of May 22?
An article from The Economist circa 1994 suggests that transferring sovereignty across to European institutions follows the same logic as individuals handing over power to a government within a nation-state: “some things can be done better together than separately.” Central to Farage’s creed is the idea that Britain has ceded too much control over to the EU, consequently; findings by The House of Commons Library suggests that around 15-50% of UK legislation is directly influenced by proceedings in Brussels. What follows is a brief discussion of British immigration, one of the more contentious powers the EU holds over Britain.
The EU’s freedom of movement directive allows citizens of EU member-states to freely live and work in other EU member-states. It is mainly due to this directive and the subsequent spike of immigration from other EU nations that immigration became a cause for debate in this country. A 2012 report by The Migration Observatory – an Oxford University think-tank – states that migration to Britain from the rest of the EU stands at around four times more than EU migration from Britain.
The report also states: “The impact of EU freedom of movement on overall net migration in the UK is about a quarter of the total.” These facts coupled with embarrassing media driven incidents such as when Keith Vaz found the ‘next wave of migrants’ was a small group mainly consisting of a single Romanian man starting a job the next day, leads one to presume that the issue of immigration is in fact, a non issue.
When Nigel Farage exclaimed that Britain is now unrecognisable due to mass immigration, he included a charming anecdote where he described not hearing the English language spoken on a train for a while. This leads me to wonder if it is in fact just foreigners that he has a problem with. If that is the case then the following would probably not be of much interest to Nigel and his party.
Immigration is good for the economy. Those opposed to EU membership are often heard declaring that EU immigrants come to Britain in order to take advantage of the welfare state. This is simply not the case, one example being a 2013 study by University College London which found that since 1995; EU immigrants paid in 4% more to the system than they received, in contrast to native-born Britons, who only paid in 93% back. Another report, this time by The Department for Work and Pensions, states that in 2013 6.7% of non-British nationals claimed Job Seekers Allowance, compared to 16.4% of British nationals.
I believe that suggesting that the vast majority of EU immigrants are coming here to abuse our welfare system is akin to claiming that the majority of the 16% of British nationals claiming JSA are in fact hard-working individuals genuinely struggling to find work. Victor Spirescu, (a high percentage of the new wave of Romanian migrants) explained his decision to come to Britain thus: "[I earned] ten Euros a day in construction in Romania, here I can get ten Euros an hour."
Nigel Farage, at the 2013 UKIP Conference claimed that more foreigners arrived in Britain in 2010 than in any previous year. While this is true – on record 252,000 immigrants is the largest single influx – it does not take into account any previous immigration influx. One example occurred during the late 17th century when historians estimated that around 50,000 Huguenots came to Britain to start new lives.
Clearly in 2010 200,000 more immigrants arrived than estimates from the late 17th century suggest, but considering that the population of Britain all those years ago was approximately 5 million, the figures perhaps start to lose their value. 2010’s 252,000 immigrants make up under 0.425% of the current British population, whereas when the Huguenots came to 'steal' our jobs they would have made up a full 1 percent of their contemporary British population.
The details listed above give some indication of the meaninglessness of the current debate over Europe. While it is possible to pull countless dubious statistics against the opposition when needed, it is all essentially pointless rhetoric. Europe is an altogether complex issue where facts are notoriously hard to pin down. What is clear though is that there is no context within which to view the ‘facts’ that have been made available. There is no way we can determine what legislation may have been passed had we not joined the EU and taken a completely different route.
I do not think we should leave the EU. The apparently countless waves of immigrants crashing onto our shores each day reported by the tabloids have never caused me to panic. Based upon personal experience (and what I consider to be common sense) I believe that the vast majority of EU immigrants come here to work, but they do not come here to become bank managers, teachers or paramedics. Most come to work menial jobs for minimum wage. As for stealing our jobs it is pure fantasy. Consider Victor Spirescu, who washes cars for his ten Euros an hour, the 93% of immigrants who work are employed in jobs that any native-born Briton can attain.
I have worked in a factory where, as a native-born Briton, I was a minority to other EU nationalities. My time there certainly left an impression; the work was consistently bleak, back-breaking and boring. Anyone possessing basic English skills and a beating heart who wanted to work could obtain a position. I propose that EU migrants have no damaging impact on the ability for native-born Britons to gain or keep employment. Instead I suggest that UKIP’s maintained hysteria is just good old fashioned racism, my social consciousness dictates that I do not get offended if I spot someone with a different colour of skin…or a voice speaking in a language I do not understand.
A report echoing similarly-grounded logic from The London School of Economics' centre for Economic Performance states: "there is little evidence of overall adverse effects of immigration on wages and employment for people born in the UK...it is hard to find evidence of much displacement of UK workers or lower wages... they certainly do not receive preferential access to housing."
So in answer to my earlier question, at stake on May 22nd is our dignity and control. I would like to believe that racists make up an utter minority of UK, and that the 30,000 members of UKIP are mostly misinformed slightly-bigoted middle-class alcoholics who have got a bit carried away with the underdog sentiment and the notion that Nigel Farage is ‘an normal chap, who has had enough of being bossed around by those bullies in Brussels.’
If the British public did decide that EU immigration into Britain is a hazard to our health, that Britain is better off without the Human Rights Act, and that having to renegotiate around 50% of our trade rights is a worthwhile gamble to take; and Britain left the EU what options are available to us ?
Farage is eager for us to regain control of our legislation and trade. Being a member-state of the EU gives Britain a certain diplomatic clout, if we were to try and renegotiate trade deals it would be from a much weaker position, with a strong likelihood of us walking away with inferior deals than those we currently maintain. UKIP want to follow the Swiss example where they have accepted certain legislation put forth by the EU in order to participate in the EU’s internal market. This option cannot realistically be taken seriously as the agreement between Switzerland and the EU is considered a poor decision by Brussels, which they are unlikely to repeat.
UKIP maintain that emerging global markets such as China, India and Brazil would be valuable trade associates (the EU is currently drawing up trade agreements with certain Latin American nations), but this is again a gamble upon which UKIP wish to stake Britain’s economy. In short, leaving the EU would mean choosing from an unhealthy selection of gambles that would in the best-case scenario mean several years of rebuilding before some sort of vaguely prosperous stability is reached. What good is control when all your options have run out?
