BBC exposes BNP

[MikeH]

He's a politician.

[Drogue]

But PA has a point. Howard is trying to appeal to the mainstream, and so hardline voters might turn to the BNP. It's like Nader and the Dems. I don't think the BNP is the entirely racist organisation that it is somtimes portrayed as, however, as PA says:

we probably have enough racists in this country to make a lot of BNP members racists.

Most parties follow their membership, and as such, since a good proportion of the BNP is racist, it's policies will be somewhat racist. The fact so many of them are like that is why I'd never vote for them, even if I agreed with their stance on immigration.

People who don't want to support racism, but do want to end immigration, have nowhere to go, it seems. People who would agree with David Davis, The Sun or The Mail, who usually vote Tory, but who may defect if the Tories try to capture the centre.

The Tories are stuck between a rock and a hard place. If they appeal to these people, while they are numerous, they lose the centre ground, which means Labour win the election. If they go for the centre, they'll lose some support to the BNP and UKIP, and won't get enough of the centre to beat Labour. Unless the Liberals take a lot of out Labour's left, while Howard manages to keep possible BNP voters and capture the centre at once (a big push for public service choice while also pushing for anti-immigration might do it), the Tories will lose the next general election. It's a tall order, but with Iraq going badly, public services being fought over choice, and the Euro-sceptic feeling very much apparent, it's doable.

[MikeH]

We can't end immigration, we need immigrants. They are vital to the economy.

Illegal immigration and false asylum claims are the problem not legal immigration.

[Solly]

"We can't end immigration, we need immigrants. They are vital to the economy."

I'd perhaps agree, if we were at full employment.

I think a far better solution would be an overhaul of the post-18 education system so training for jobs is of a higher quality, more credible, and more accessible.

Once that happens, immigration is unnecessary.

Of course, if the incumbent government sees improving vocational education (and I don't just mean tasks like plumbing and carpentry here) as more difficult than just opening the borders, then we'll be stuck with the current problem.

[MikeH]

Well we don't have the skills so we need them. You can't just turn off the tap. Even in the future there'll be new skills that we don't have here. Even if the immigrants are the people teaching those skills to certain Brits.

It's a lot cheaper to employ people trained abroad than train them here. Employed skilled immigrants aren't a problem anyway are they.

[Solly]

Well we don't have the skills so we need them. You can't just turn off the tap. Even in the future there'll be new skills that we don't have here. Even if the immigrants are the people teaching those skills to certain Brits.

If you are expecting an endless flood of available of immigrants to be able to pick and choose from I think you are mistaken.

We should educate our own by learning if necessary from other countries. We are an advanced and developed economy so we should not be incapable of something that another country can do.

It's a lot cheaper to employ people trained abroad than train them here. Employed skilled immigrants aren't a problem anyway are they.

Then you get into the problem of brain drain from the "donor" country. How long will a donor country be happy educating spending for its people for them to piss off and earn elsewhere? It's not a long-term solution for donor or host country, so the sooner we get into place a credible system of training the unemployed to fill the ever-changing gaps in the labour market the better it will be not just for us but also for other countries that contribute immigrants.

[MikeH]

I am in agreement that we should educate people who already live here first where possible and that vocational education is important.

Immigration isn't bad in and of itself though.

[Drogue]

Originally posted by MikeH
Well we don't have the skills so we need them. You can't just turn off the tap. Even in the future there'll be new skills that we don't have here. Even if the immigrants are the people teaching those skills to certain Brits.

It's a lot cheaper to employ people trained abroad than train them here. Employed skilled immigrants aren't a problem anyway are they.

Why not use the Aussie system of points? Points for being trained, for age, for education, etc. Anyone over a certain level can be an economic immigrant, and anyone who isn't either has to manage to claim asylum or leave.

Economic immigration is good at times and bad at times, and this is the best way to only let it be a good thing.

[MikeH]

Er... that's pretty much the principle of the system we already have. What are you suggesting we change?

[Drogue]

Is it? I thought ours was horrendously complicated, and meant that people who shouldbe deported didn't. Also, the uproar about letting in multi-millionairres last time was a bit weird - just think of the tax they'll pay

[MikeH]

That's the asylum procedure not immigration.

[Drogue]

Ahhh... if it works like that, in a simple way, why do we have the problems with it? I thought both asylum and immigration were choked up?

[MikeH]

Too many people applying for the system to cope with. Most legal immigrants have to apply for visas etc before they come here. It's the asylum seekers that just turn up we're struggling with.

[Solly]

"Too many people applying for the system to cope with"

We're an island. We ought to have far fewer problems than any other European country as a result - we seem to have the most.

[MikeH]

We don't really. We just ***** about it more.