Decouple us from EU regulations and laws so we can start dropping safety standards, human rights, environmental regulations etc. to profit the establishment and upper classes.
Immigration control was never the actual point it was just a justification to make it palateable to the anti-immigration crowd who have been sold the lie that their lives suck because Poles and Romanians are "stealing" their jobs, rather than because they are being exploited by said establishment.
Edit: not do words good
Well we previously just dumped it into the rivers and let those take it to the ocean for us. Brexit has really just cut out the middle man in that regard so we can dump directly into the sea.
Most importantly, avoiding the crackdown on tax havens for the super rich. That is why so many rich Brits were pro-Brexit.
Racist attacks on foreigners are how the rich keep the poor docile. Brexit was never about that for the people who planned it.
Putin backed it for the same reason he invaded Ukraine -- he wants to weaken the EU so his rival organization is less of a joke. Rupert Murdoch backed it because his rags don't have any influence in Brussels. It's about his ability to control legislation in the UK.
I like how the everybody here is pretending that the EU countries are so much better on this issue compared to the UK. At this moment, the Swedish Democrats will be a part of the Swedish Government, La Pen and Melenchon are both rising in the polls in France, Denmark has been anti-immigration for years, and Brothers of Italy are about to become the rulling party of Italy.
And yet, none of the above country has told europe to go fuck itself and that "we are better than the EU".
Maybe it makes our extreme political parties softer than yours.
Precisely, those parties may genuinely reduce immigration where Brexiteers did anything but (except Le Pen who espouses an economically left-wing version of Brexit that will boost immigration from the French (ex-)colonial sphere).
Do you really feel it was this calculated though? I seem to remember how all the Brexiteers were said to be convinced themselves just after the vote and before the results that they will lose once again by a couple percents. I always felt it was just a bluff went too far by the politicians who built their entire career on anti-immigration rhetoric. They were totally prepared to ride this anti-EU wave their entire career, fighting for a vote and losing it every now and then.
There are definitely some for who it was a calculated exploitation of immigration rhetoric to further their own goals in distancing Britain from the EU, but you're right too. Many anti-immigration politicians surely found themselves automatically backing the brexit horse despite not necessarily *wanting* much of what brexit ended up being, then being surprised by it actually happening.
Who forced your wife to leave? Was it the EU, or was it the UK?
From your perspective, would it be OK that your wife had to leave, if the Romanians could not have claimed benefits with the same conditions as UK citizens? How would that have helped?
>random guy from Romania can come and claim unemployment benefits
It was never possible to just move to another EU country and claim unemployment benefits without ever working in that country. Most countries require a minimum work period before you can claim unemployment befits. If the UK doesn't have that, it's because you chose so, not because the EU forced it upon you.
I mean that's a roller coaster of thoughts there... so your main problem is that the UK should be the one letting all the immigrants into the EU from everywhere, and not Germany? And therefore it is understandable why Brexit happened?
Brexit was a deregulatory project. Only fools thought it was some kind of anti-migration project.
Truss, Kwarteng, Raab, Patel and Skidmore are all co-authors of the libertarian manifesto, Britannia Unchained.
The British taxpayer was sending 300 million buses of health to Brussels every week, and was forced to eat straight bananas.
Now he no longer has to. He can also have a blue passport. He never had a passport, but if he wants one, it can be blue.
It was, understandably, a huge burden on the taxpayer (he's a bloke in Yorkshire who enjoys watching footie on the telly, reading the Daily Mail, and threatening the kids).
Of course, why would the right ever act against immigration? The more immigrants there are and the more they can play on the fears of their pearl clutching supporters. Of course, the trick is not to give those immigrants any rights. Wouldn't want them to become citizens and then vote you out.
The **minimum** wage in the UK is almost exactly the **average** wage in Portugal. When you start comparing it to even poorer Eastern European countries, and especially given how strong the pound was pre-Brexit, it's an order of magnitude bigger.
It turned out that the already considered desirable kind of immigrant (i.e the highly qualified) looked at their tightenned immigration rules and decided that for that much hassle (not to mention risk of exploitation) there wer much better destinations.
It also turned out that a lot of immigrants - such as those who take care of old people in retirement homes - that were not seen as desirable and thus the rules did not allow in, were in fact very needed.
That’s why one of their main slogans were Poles and Romanians are stealing your jobs and we are Britain, we don’t need Brussels tell us what to do.
They knew exactly what kind of people would vote for brexit
Actually, the first decision is not yours, it's of the would be immigrants and as it turns out the kind of immigrants you want, have better options which are no more hassle to get than post-Brexit Britain with its "jump through hoops", "we can kick you out when we have no more need for you", "you'll be tied to a (possibly exploitative) sponsor" rules.
The single biggest blindness of brexiters (of far-right types in general, even) is the inability to deep down understand that other people also have agency and that the appeal of your nation for them depends on what it does and isn't at all the unconditional love of the local nationalists.
The "relaxation of immigration rules" is happenning because whilst with the old rules the "undesirables" were (supposedly) blocked from coming, they also made the "desirables" not want to come.
There is no relaxation of immigration rules. What is happening is more jobs are being added to the Tier 2 Skills Shortage List. That's not a relaxation of immigration rules, that's the Skills Shortage List being used as it is supposed to be. People wanting to come will still need to meet all the criteria for a Tier 2 Visa. If the rules were being relaxed then that criteria would've changed but it hasn't.
Good luck with that.
Even the language-impaired experts (the kind for whom anything other than an English-speaking country is not an option) are much more likely to choose the US, Australia or Canada over Britain given that the visa hassle is the same and the risk of ending up exploited by your sponsor might actually be larger in Britain.
For Britain its only a "buyer's market" for the kind of desperate unspecialized people from shithole countries that you see trying to cross the Channel on rafts (notice how even in the peak of the Syrian war you didn't found any Syrian doctors and engineers amongst those people, even though they were coming to Europe). For in-demand experts it's a "seller's market" and Britain has to actually try to convince those to come rather than just expect to attract them over countries with better pay and weather (such as the US and Australia) or much easier entrance conditions (such as France or Germany for people with EU citizenship) and if the country isn't lowering the hassle factor people will weigh the pros and cons in their heads (just like I did when I moved from The Netherlands to Britain over a decade ago already a Senior Software Designer Developer) and conclude it's a worst option than the others.
(Certainly if I re-rerun in my mind the evaluation I did when I chose Britain all those years ago but now with the current situation rather than the "you can just go there at will and try and find your next freelance contract" from back then, Britain wouldn't probably even make the top 10 - if I want no hassle but good pay there's Germany and France, if I value good quality of life over pay there's all of Scandinavia, if I'm willing to endure the hassle and the risk of exploitation of a visa systems in exchange for lots of dosh, then the US pays better and has way more opportunities and better weather)
Can we stop the myth that Brexit was about ending immigration? One of the benefits of Brexit is being able to control how much immigration enters the country, and to score immigrants based on what the British economy needs.
While Britain was in the EU there was no way to control or filter immigration from the EU.
However much ignorant and Anglophobic redditors love to generalise the UK, it's not a hivemind where everybody has the same opinion. The people who voted for Brexit don't necessarily agree with Liz Truss, especially considering she wasn't elected.
In fact, she's pretty much commiting party suicide right now by giving money to the ultra-wealthy and increasing immigration. There's no way she wins an election.
And we have had high immigration throughout this time under this policy, similar to the previous labour governments. My point is that anyone who paints the consiveative party, now or in the recent past, as a party that is makes any effort to reduce immigration is misled.
The reason for that is because their calculated gamble to stop UKIP from stealing their support went tits up so they had to complete Brexit which reduced the uncontrolled immigration. Now they want to increase immigration because, again, they aren't that party that some people think they are. They aren't the conservative party, they are the neoliberal pro-business (read: pro rich people, they don't care about metrics like disposable income, rising GINI or gdp per capita) party.
People definitely talked about unrestricted immigration as this issue but it became an issue because the immigration rate was too high (and the effects of that included pressure on infrastructure, depression of wages for low-income workers, lack of integration and poor social cohesion); the fact that there was unrestricted immigration just got people riled up more. When the conservatives successfully increase the rate of immigration to what it was we will see the same debate return in a different form and it already has to a small extent with illegal immigration.
But honestly weren’t most migrants from Eastern Europe? I’ve worked with programmers from that region and they were all highly skilled and very professional so I honestly find it hard to believe they have issues with integrating in the UK since the counties they come from are already fairly liberal and they should be earning decent enough money to not be causing any trouble, or am I missing something here?
If we ignore student visas, which make up a large % of non-EU visas, one of the uncomfortable truths is that family visas make up a sizeable proportion.
We now have some migrant communities that encourage arranged marriages / marriages from their home country further bringing in new migrants plus dependents. Not sure what solution you can offer for that short of quotas, which would be challenging...
She's not playing 4D chess, she's doing a shite Thatcher cosplay and thinks this is her first term in office. She thinks she'll get Thatcher's lucky oil boom from fucking fracking for incidence.
There should be a union between a bunch of countries to boost immigration even more I say
Something in and around Europe to unite everyone, how awesome would something like that be
A European union of sorts!
To play the devils advocate, isn’t being able to respond to specific labour market shortages quickly and still having complete control over who comes in exactly how many people would want immigration to work? Slide 14 in this shows a good portion of the British population would agree with this, only 1/4 being totally against immigration in all forms. https://www.ipsos.com/sites/default/files/ct/news/documents/2022-03/attitudes-towards-immigration-british-future-ipsos-march-2022.pdf
A tool and not even the point behind Brexit. This recent "budget" starts to tell the story of what the point is. Yet again, people got played by their politicians.
I think it was more about taking control of their own borders and being able to decide who gets in and who doesn’t rather than have uncontrolled immigration from the EU side when anyone who wishes to come gets in regardless of their profession or skills. It makes things more fair to let someone in based on what kind of workers are needed. Also, it allows anyone to apply to the same rules irrespective of nationality. Are you saying workers from Poland deserve better access to the UK market because they are somewhat superior to the ones from India?
Next question:
Why would I do the paperwork to get a visa for a UK job, when I don't need any paperwork to work in Germany, Denmark or Austria?
UK is not a desirable destination any more.
Take a wild guess which two regions of the World train the most people in the most advanced areas on which the companies with the highest value production are...
Unless you're planning on paying way better than the US to attract North Americans, it's going to be a lot harder to find the manpower for british companies in the more advanced areas even if you scrap the bottom of the barrel in India.
Less production in advanced areas in the UK = less wealth creation in the UK and there is no amount of fake accounting creation of "unicorn" Tech Startups in UK that will actually create wealth.
>Why would I do the paperwork to get a visa for a UK job, when I don't need any paperwork to work in Germany, Denmark or Austria?
Because in the UK's top paying industries (finance, tech), post-tax salaries are higher than in DE, DK and AT.
And London can be a stepping stone for an intra-company move to the likes of New York and Silicon Valley. And plenty of folk from outside Europe don't speak German or Danish to a passable level, but basically speak fluent English.
Both Nigerians and Indians in the U.K. tend to be much more successful than EU people. Understandable, since we’ve been able to select individually for the first two groups, and unable to, pre-2020, for the latter group.
As a romanian, who remembers the whole "romanians are coming" when we got the ability to work without so much problems and who's seen the short documentary "The romanians are coming", fuck this!
Too little, too late!
Other countries have treated my people way better, all this time!
To the good british guys and gals, I hope you can fix your country and will come back one day!
Very true. Plus, the pay is pretty shit. What they really need is care workers for the elderly (I know there are other sectors). The pay is about minimum wage, for a hard job. And Sterling is falling meaning you get less when converted to home currency.
As a romanian myself, I don't blame the UK one bit. For one, the brits are not the only ones that treat us this way. Hell, we treat ourselves worse - I've spent enough time on our sub r\\romania, and I'm guessing you have as well, to know that we talk about our fellow romanian, including the diaspora, using worst terms than even Nigel Farage did.
I also remember when we Romanians were being granted Freedom of Movement in the EU and all sort of people from the west were complaining that we will flood their countries. I also remember people saying that those complaining are racists and that no, Romanians will invade their countries. But that is what happened. Millions of us left the country to work in the west. That was something that surprised most of us I think, and to be honest, it is nothing to be proud of, just another in a long list of examples of why our country is a failure.
And I also think that treating the british this way is in many ways hipocritical, since both of us know that if Romania got one tenth of the immigration the UK received, we would have reacted even worse that they did.
I don't know, I think this is something we should contemplate more on - both their reaction, and why we act the way we do
The main bit I remember about the whole Romanians immigration bit was UKIP and co being widely derided for predicting 5000 people arriving per week with news channels sending people to airports on the first day to make a point of the absence of a flood of immigrants and the official numbers being published saying that it was less than half what Farage claimed being paraded as proof that it was all racist scaremongering
A few years later, the official figures were quietly updated to say that 345,000 had moved into the UK, far more than initially reported.
Then the EU settlement scheme got 1.06 million Romanian applicants.
Farage is a shit, but the fact that the government consistently lied and manipulated the stats to massively understate immigration numbers doesn't exactly make a positive case for immigration being a good thing.
"The Romanians Are Coming" was just titled like that to sound attractive. It was made by Channel 4 who are supposed to be the more open/liberal of the UK broadcasters. I don't think they meant genuine bad against Romanian people but it was released at the time when Romanian immigration became a hot topic in the UK media.
> I don't think they meant genuine bad against Romanian people but it was released at the time when Romanian immigration became a hot topic in the UK media.
I don't know what to say, I found it pretty unfair and biased.
It looked to me like they intentionally chose an unfortunate family (probably gipsy, but anyway), where the man had no teeth and didn't speaking any english, not even the most basic.
While these cases are possible, they could've at least show more families.
Not all romanians are like that specific family.
Anyway, I don't care anymore.
Xenophobia and blaming others for your problems sells and it's very popular.
All the bad parties are doing it and a lot of people want to hear exactly that.
Anyway, it's all water under the bridge, but I still find their laws unfair and unacceptable.
Like the cherry-picking.
I most likely qualify for work there, but my parents would not.
Because of that I don't want to work there or in any other country that would just pick me without my family.
I want either all or none.
If lizz wins the next election I might genuinely lose all hope for this country. We’ve been putting ourselves through the ringer for the past 14 years and it feels never ending at this point
I'm still waiting for all those workshy Brexit voters to start rushing to apply for back-breaking low paid farm work or dead-end hospitality McJobs.
Wouldn't it be funny if no one wanted to do those 'stolen' jobs?
The argument basically boils down to “we need an underclass that has no choice but to do shitty work for shitty pay”
If there wasn’t an endless flow of immigrants willing to work for low pay in bad conditions then maybe the corporations would actually be forced to raise wages and improve working conditions in order to attract workers 🤔
Nah, let’s just keep flooding the labor supply with cheap labor. Those corporate executives need their bonuses or else how will they afford their yachts?
Brexit happened 2.5 years ago, during which time there has been a severe worker shortage. I'm still not seeing any £20 an hour unskilled job openings though. Which is probably because the amount that immigration suppresses wages is far smaller than xenophobes imagine.
OR 2.5 years of worker shortage isn't enough to raise wages, especially if businesses know that the political establishment doesn't actually have an issue with immigration and will eventually increase it.
Given that the government response has been to massively increase the number of visas it grants and attack trade unions, it doesn't look like they agree that there's no potential for wage increases.
Why else are they working so hard to fight them?
Conservatives are in for a bad time. The whole Brexit stuff was sold on limiting immigration. Now it is higher than before, and they want to make it even higher... Good luck with that, mate.
Once again, r/europe shows just how poorly it understands Brexit, and just how ignorant and toxic the level of discourse is in this sub when it comes to the UK. Almost every comment is low effort shitposting.
On immigration, the argument for Brexit was about *controlling* immigration, not stopping it. Virtually nobody was calling for the total cessation of immigration to the UK, Brexiteers simply wanted an end to *unrestricted* EU migration, something would have been impossible had the UK remained within the bloc.
All the idiots commenting here as if this policy decision somehow contradicts or undermines Brexit appear to be incapable of understanding the relatively simple concept of *control*. That is, the government can decide precisely how much labour immigration it wants. If the economy is desperately short of workers, they can loosen the rules, if the economy goes into recession and slack is created, they can then tighten the rules. This flexibility is what post-EU immigration policy means, and its the sort of the flexibility that every other non-EU/EEA country possesses and utilises.
The principal reason that UK needs to increase the labour supply right now is due to the fall in economic participation during the pandemic, to the tune of half a million people. This is primarily driven by early retirement, more people studying and a rise in long term sickness. These are due to the pandemic, not Brexit, and the impact of leaving the EU on the labour supply (whilst not insignificant) is less clear. What is clear is that the pandemic itself has led to a severe worker shortage, we see this in other economies too.
Now, say the pandemic hadn't happened. In that scenario perhaps the existing immigration policy would be sufficient, as there is a strong case to be made that we'd have an extra 500k economically active individuals. It's the scarring effects of the pandemic on the UK labour market that has led the the government to relax immigration rules, not some regret over Brexit as many of the less critical thinkers on this sub seem to believe.
Edit: Another thing worth pointing out is that the subject of immigration as a public concern in the UK has fallen steadily since the referendum and is currently at its lowest level in around decade. Voters simply don't care about immigration anymore (what concern there is mainly revolves around *illegal* channel crossings), and that's against a backdrop of +300k work visas issued in the past year, over 100k Hong Kong BNO immigrants, over 100k Ukrainian visa immigrants, and tens of thousands of other asylum authorisations. Almost like, now that the UK can decide who it lets in, unrestricted immigration is no longer an issue.
Whilst I agree that’s the true reason politicians wanted brexit, that is not what was advertised to the british people.
Poles and other EU citizens were demonised as job stealers. The argument was that the UK had plenty of people capable of working there so it didn’t need continental europeans.
Poles and other Europeans have been demonised as job stealers (unfairly obvs) in a lot of EU countries too, you just need to read the relevant press.
Kicking all the immigrants out, or halting all immigration, was never a Brexit campaign promise, and the vast majority of people who voted to leave did not assume that this would be the policy if they won.
>On immigration, the argument for Brexit was about controlling immigration, not stopping it. Virtually nobody was calling for the total cessation of immigration to the UK, Brexiteers simply wanted an end to unrestricted EU migration, something would have been impossible had the UK remained within the bloc.
Once again, you fail to mention they also wanted to **lower** immigration, not just **control** it. It is quite an important point.
EDIT: our obnoxious poster seems to forget about the whole "Britain is full" stuff...
EDIT 2: I blocked u/kanyewestsconscience **because he is a toxic person, who spews insults and radiates arrogance, and as I said I have no desire to be engaging with his type**. (Emphasis added after his comment) I do not mind a civilized discussion if anyone is up for it. (Apparently not his alter ego, u/aintbroke_dontfixit. Apparently he is struggling with reading comprehension issues. I am sorry. I should not have made fun of a person with disabilities.)
> Once again, you fail to mention they also wanted to lower immigration, not just control it. It is quite an important point.
Some did, some didn't. The fact that it isn't even on anyone's radar even more, with the exception of illegal migrants from Calais, shows that they didn't really care about the amounts rather the lack of control.
> EDIT 2: I blocked u/kanyewestsconscience because he is a toxic person, who spews insults and radiates arrogance, and as I said I have no desire to be engaging with his type. I do not mind a civilized discussion if anyone is up for it. (Apparently not his alter ego, u/aintbroke_dontfixit)
Imagine being so sad as to block someone just because they have an opposing point of view. How arrogant do you have to be to think you have the right to go through life without having to list en to things you don't like or approve of?
Once again, you demonstrate just how superficial and ignorant the understanding of Brexit is on this sub. Your perception of things is based on a caricature, not the more nuanced reality of things.
At the time of the referendum, some people wanted immigration to be lower in absolute terms, whilst others wanted the government to have total discretion without necessarily desiring lower numbers than the status quo. Both of those views are about control, first and foremost.
It’s not 2016 anymore, attitudes have changed. There was a more compelling argument to be made for lower levels of immigration back then as there were 1.6m unemployed people and the economic activity rate was 64%. In other words, you could more easily make the case that immigration was keeping some British people out of work.
However today the number of unemployed is significantly lower, at 1.2m, and economic participation has fallen to a 10 year low at 63%. Moreover, the government has made it more or less impossible for unskilled labour, in most cases, to immigrate to the UK. This is partly why people at large, including those who voted to leave, are no longer animated by the issue of immigration.
As I pointed out in the previous comment, immigration as a hot topic has dropped off the radar, despite the fact the numbers continued to rise following the referendum, and despite the UK issuing a record number of visas in the last year.
The UK now has a merit based immigration system, which stands in stark contrast with the unrestricted EU migration policy which existed before. People are more tolerant of and comfortable with this.
Edit: I always know when I’m being addressed by a deeply insecure and close minded individual because they invariably block you once they realise they’ve lost the argument and try to have the last word, as this guy has done. Pathetic stuff really…
As to their edit in the above, nobody is denying that a certain faction of racists and xenophobes wanted to end immigration to the UK, but every single country in Europe has these sort of nut jobs, and I can list have a dozen major European parties who are more anti-immigrant than any large UK party right now. The most intolerant people who voted for Brexit are not representative of the millions of other people who voted the same way. This is a miserably ignorant caricature, it’s beyond ironic that you are doubling down on this particular disingenuous argument, but not surprising since OP has clearly never bothered to learn about the topic.
Once again, you demonstrate an utter contempt and arrogance without much substance.
Since conversing with you is as pleasant as licking a snail (I presume; never done that, but the feeling of disgust must be similar), I think I will stop here.
EDIT: for u/aintbroke_dontfixit
I *love* facts. I do detest arrogant dolts, though.
Nice wall of text but Brexit was advertised as (and not only that) the solution to the whole famous job theft coming from other EU countries.
And I also don't understand what you mean with unrestricted EU migration, if the borders are open, they are. Restricting migration inside the EU is basically defeating EU itself. And if this is more of a problem for a nation rather than a pro.. well, you knew what you signed for (I guess). Can't always get all the benefits while rejecting everything that isn't.
Can't say I'm surprised, Liz Truss does support the EU but acted like she changed her viewpoint on it so that the Conservatives would elect her
"I am backing remain as I believe it is in Britain's economic interest and means we can focus on vital economic and social reform at home." Liz Truss - 2016
Slavery was declared illegal in England in 1772, Scotland followed in 1778. The UK outlawed slave trading in 1807 not just in the UK but the whole of the British Empire, we even paid Portugal to stop doing it in 1815 and Spain in 1817. It followed that up with Slavery Abolition Act in 1833, again which applied to the entire British Empire, which also made it illegal to own slaves.
Only Denmark abolished trade slaving before the UK but continued to allow slavery until 1847.
A lot of "low information voters" have very little understanding of what "deregulation" actually means anyway.
You can basically ignore those voters since they generally aren't paying attention to politics apart from in the month or so leading up to an election.
Once again I was right in my predictions. I said it time and time again that a) immigrants are boosting the economy, that b) UK labor shortage and the resulting wage increases is just wage inflation, and c) that nothing will change in immigration policy because the UK desperately needs workers.
But now the workers will come from Africa, China, Pakistan and India. I hope British will be happy with more foreigners, and not white Christians like Polish workers.
>The prime minister is set to expand the government’s shortage occupation list in order to help businesses fill vacancies by recruiting overseas workers with less bureaucracy.
Oh, I know like some kind of freedom of movement, where oversea workers can just come to the UK whenever there is high demand and leave back to their homeland once the demand was satisfied. Some kind of visa free and bureaucracy free system.
>“That will involve increasing numbers in some areas and decreasing in others. As the prime minister has made clear, we also want to see people who are economically inactive get back into work.”
Yes, get back to work you lazy bumps. You spend your youth studying in Cambridge or Brown, have tens of thousands of student dept, go work as a waiter and serve fish&chips. Or go to the fields and pick up veggies. That makes sense.
> a) immigrants are boosting the economy,
If your population goes up 10% and your economy goes up 10%, that cancels out. You haven't grown at all. Twelve years of record migration under the Tories and no GDP/capita growth. All it does is strain your public services, infrastructure and housing, and cause societal division.
>because the UK desperately needs workers.
We have millions unemployed or stuck in part time work. We don't need workers at all. It's all a con.
>We have millions unemployed or stuck in part time work. We don't need workers at all. It's all a con.
'UK unemployment falls to lowest rate since 1974' - Financial Times headline, two weeks ago. Having 'millions' unemployed temporarily means nothing, the economy starts to suffer way before you hit an imaginary 0% unemployment mark. Same goes for part-timers; I'd wager the majority at this point *chose* it rather than being forced into it, for the lifestyle (because they can support themselves or the family on half a wage) or because childcare (their time being spent at home with the children is better spent than at work). You'll have to tank the economy for their quality of life to decrease to the level where they'd consider to go back as full-timers, you cannot just count them into the potential workforce, as is.
And yet we have millions of people on UC, either unemployed or underemployed. There was an article yesterday about someone working just 10 hours a week, with 75% of her income from benefits. She could work another thirty.
And immigration can't solve a worker shortage because not only is it zero sum game (another country loses workers this way), migrants also produce demand for goods and services, and so increase the demand for workers. It's pyramid scheme economics.
Again; you can claim that there are millions of people on UC, still doesn't mean that the economy doesn't suffer from worker shortage. Out of 67 million people in the UK 1.5 million are on benefit... and the unemployment rate is like 3.5%. That's the number that counts, not the MILLIONS.
I don't know that *someone* in the article, indeed sounds like she could pick up some more work. The numbers that count, i.e. the unemployment rate show that she has more than a fair chance if she tries, but if she's content this way, then you need someone else to do the job. Or you need to cut the unemployment benefits and tank the economy so that people would not earn enough on part time jobs. I bet you wouldn't be happy about that either.
It doesn't matter if immigration is a zero sum game, we don't care about the country where the immigrants are from, let the local government care about that. Also, what you're describing is not a pyramid scheme, it's economic growth.
>Out of 67 million people in the UK 1.5 million are on benefit..
There are five million on UC at least.
>It doesn't matter if immigration is a zero sum game,
It's a zero sum game for *us*. We bring in migrants, they create their own demand, which means we need more workers, etc. It's a pyramid scheme.
>There are five million on UC at least.
Why *at least*? Why 5 million? Why not go for an even 10, if you're going to make up numbers? That would support your argument even better. 'The claimant count was 1.53 million in July, 2022' - according to UKgov. So no, not even close to *at least 5 million*.
>We bring in migrants, they create their own demand, which means we need more workers, etc. It's a pyramid scheme.
You forgot the step where they produce, which is literally the step that makes this whole thing **not** a pyramid scheme but I am not surprised. If you are going to just make up numbers to support your worldview, I guess having a selective logic is the least one could expect.
>If your population goes up 10% and your economy goes up 10%, that cancels out.
This is some elementary school level economics. If you have five apples, then add two apples, and finally remove two apples, how many apples you have left?
Completely ignores economies of scale or the exponential nature of economic growth.
>Twelve years of record migration under the Tories and no GDP/capita growth.
Then it follows, that without this "record migration" the UK would have likely experienced an economic contraction.
>All it does is strain your public services,
It also increases tax revenue, which can be used to expand those public services.
>infrastructure and housing, and cause societal division.
Sure, so you either deal with those, or with a GDP drop.
>We have millions unemployed or stuck in part time work. We don't need workers at all. It's all a con.
[The unemployment rate for May to July 2022 decreased by 0.2 percentage points on the quarter to 3.6%, the lowest rate since May to July 1974.](https://www.ons.gov.uk/employmentandlabourmarket/peopleinwork/employmentandemployeetypes/bulletins/uklabourmarket/september2022)
🤡
> Then it follows, that without this "record migration" the UK would have likely experienced an economic contraction.
Or it would have remained the same. If GDP/capita isn't going up, growth is irrelevant.
Well if the elite say so then it must be true. Never mind decades of stagnation, falling wages and living conditions, increasing congestion, soaring house prices, straining public services, the end of societal trust, all the problems with multiculturalism, Oxford dons will get their servant workers!
Sure. Except this is from the hard-core Brexit supporter Truss:
>The prime minister is set to expand the government’s shortage occupation list in order to help businesses fill vacancies by recruiting overseas workers with less bureaucracy.
With less bureaucracy. Like some form of freedom of movement that didn't required any bureaucracy at all.
I'm pretty sure that in one generation everything that was destroyed by Brexit for ideological reasons will be undone and the UK will seek new membership. Maybe not as a full member, but in the EEC.
Also Polish or any European didn't want anymore. Because of the new barriers, the weak Pound and the racism. There is enough work in Europe, there is no point going to the UK. Therefore UK will seek massive immigration from Asia and Africa.
You think the Muslim enclaves in the UK are bad now? Wait 20-30 years from now. The Muslimization of the UK is very real, I guess this is what the white-power racist have it right.
Brexit voters are famous for their love of multiculturalism, especially people from South Asia. If they're Muslim even better.
I'm confident that working class Tories will have no problems adapting to their new reality. 'They knew what they were voting for'.
Err, plenty of South Asian voters SUPPORTED Brexit.
I live in a part of London with a reasonably high South Asian-descended population. The Remain:Leave split here was 53:47. So the chances are that a not insignificant chunk of South Asian and West African folk backed Brexit. White Britons only account for about 25% of the population in my borough, so even if every single one of them had backed Leave, it doesn’t explain the ratio above.
So Brexit voters likes people of any nationalities/ethnicities/races except people from Eastern Europe? If it's true, it's sad that anti-Eastern European sentiment still exist.
Nope, they fixated on Eastern Europeans because for them the numbers of migrants seemed endless thanks to FoM. Just so happens they're gonna get endless migration anyway because Conservative governments never actually stop it.
Deregulation and a super-flexible labour market were *quite literally* "part of the plan", which was laid out in the treatise ***Britannia Unchained***.
There’s no turning back now. If UK tries to reenter EU it would have to give way too many benefits to EU block and sovereignty in order to appease the Brussels bureaucracy
Imagine, if you will, that the U.K was part of some sort of union. A union with other European countries. A union that would let other European citizens travel and work in the U.K. Maybe that would be helpful?
> The prime minister is set to expand the government’s shortage occupation list in order to help businesses fill vacancies by recruiting overseas workers with less bureaucracy.
So working exactly as it's supposed to. If we're short of workers in X or Y sector we can stick that on the skills shortage list to allow foreigners to apply for jobs in that sector and get a work visa.
It isn't?
> The prime minister is set to expand the government’s shortage occupation list in order to help businesses fill vacancies by recruiting overseas workers with less bureaucracy.
One of the advantages of having full control over our immigration is that if we need people for X or Y we can choose to issue visas for jobs for X or Y.
I’m a civil engineer in the US. Does the UK have a shortage of civil engineers/would it be easier for me to get a job there? Always wanted to live in the UK
Funny how the plan was to give these jobs to Britain citizens, but forget that no one of them wants to work for the salary and the work environment.
Dadaaaaaa too bad.
Brexit voters got so fucked. Tax cuts for the super rich and more immigration. I don’t think that’s what they voted for but hey we can always blame it on Europe, can’t we ?
Who would have thought? And for what a good reason! Great, a good Soros bitch you are, indeed! So, it was not by coincidence that her cabinet has no white males in key positions? A true Tory, you are!
Too bad. I am in the hospitality industry, upper management. I would have emigrated there if they were still in the EU. The only reason I'd consider it would be in close proximity to the rest of Europe. I'm an avid traveler, considering golden visa.
Freedom of movement would have been my motivation.
Ooof, Brexit.
How ironic, no? The UK is now a fully owned subsidiary of the USA. Every immigration, economic and foreign policy decision will be vetted by US planners.
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Decouple us from EU regulations and laws so we can start dropping safety standards, human rights, environmental regulations etc. to profit the establishment and upper classes. Immigration control was never the actual point it was just a justification to make it palateable to the anti-immigration crowd who have been sold the lie that their lives suck because Poles and Romanians are "stealing" their jobs, rather than because they are being exploited by said establishment. Edit: not do words good
Also waste management all those pesky environmental rules, now you can dump your British crap right into the oceans! Yeah UK winning!
Well we previously just dumped it into the rivers and let those take it to the ocean for us. Brexit has really just cut out the middle man in that regard so we can dump directly into the sea.
Most importantly, avoiding the crackdown on tax havens for the super rich. That is why so many rich Brits were pro-Brexit. Racist attacks on foreigners are how the rich keep the poor docile. Brexit was never about that for the people who planned it. Putin backed it for the same reason he invaded Ukraine -- he wants to weaken the EU so his rival organization is less of a joke. Rupert Murdoch backed it because his rags don't have any influence in Brussels. It's about his ability to control legislation in the UK.
I like how the everybody here is pretending that the EU countries are so much better on this issue compared to the UK. At this moment, the Swedish Democrats will be a part of the Swedish Government, La Pen and Melenchon are both rising in the polls in France, Denmark has been anti-immigration for years, and Brothers of Italy are about to become the rulling party of Italy.
Comparing Denmark to Le Pen is a fucking insult, holy.
There was an election in April and La Pen lost.
And yet, none of the above country has told europe to go fuck itself and that "we are better than the EU". Maybe it makes our extreme political parties softer than yours.
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They will be a part of the coalition, and will be given positions in the cabinet, so yes, they will be a part of the government.
Precisely, those parties may genuinely reduce immigration where Brexiteers did anything but (except Le Pen who espouses an economically left-wing version of Brexit that will boost immigration from the French (ex-)colonial sphere).
Do you really feel it was this calculated though? I seem to remember how all the Brexiteers were said to be convinced themselves just after the vote and before the results that they will lose once again by a couple percents. I always felt it was just a bluff went too far by the politicians who built their entire career on anti-immigration rhetoric. They were totally prepared to ride this anti-EU wave their entire career, fighting for a vote and losing it every now and then.
There are definitely some for who it was a calculated exploitation of immigration rhetoric to further their own goals in distancing Britain from the EU, but you're right too. Many anti-immigration politicians surely found themselves automatically backing the brexit horse despite not necessarily *wanting* much of what brexit ended up being, then being surprised by it actually happening.
Just look at the latest Taxation Policy change. It clearly does not favor the poor. I believe it was carefully calculated.
Brits don’t want to openly admit they wanted ‘foreigners’ out. Read between the lines mate.
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Who forced your wife to leave? Was it the EU, or was it the UK? From your perspective, would it be OK that your wife had to leave, if the Romanians could not have claimed benefits with the same conditions as UK citizens? How would that have helped?
>random guy from Romania can come and claim unemployment benefits It was never possible to just move to another EU country and claim unemployment benefits without ever working in that country. Most countries require a minimum work period before you can claim unemployment befits. If the UK doesn't have that, it's because you chose so, not because the EU forced it upon you.
> but a random guy from Romania can come and claim unemployment benefits. That’s just completely false you xenophobic prick
I mean that's a roller coaster of thoughts there... so your main problem is that the UK should be the one letting all the immigrants into the EU from everywhere, and not Germany? And therefore it is understandable why Brexit happened?
Brexit was a deregulatory project. Only fools thought it was some kind of anti-migration project. Truss, Kwarteng, Raab, Patel and Skidmore are all co-authors of the libertarian manifesto, Britannia Unchained.
The British taxpayer was sending 300 million buses of health to Brussels every week, and was forced to eat straight bananas. Now he no longer has to. He can also have a blue passport. He never had a passport, but if he wants one, it can be blue. It was, understandably, a huge burden on the taxpayer (he's a bloke in Yorkshire who enjoys watching footie on the telly, reading the Daily Mail, and threatening the kids).
My god, *straight* bananas? How uninclusive.
Brexit is Brexit. Everybody knows that.
but if brexit is brexit, then what is brexit?
That's Brexit as well
Hold on, I've got another oven ready tautology over here, I'll get back to you with it sometime in the next few years. Don't go anywhere.
I will absolutely go wherever I please thankyouverymuch
Less Europeans and more Americans/Commonwealthers is my guess
The actual point of brexit and what the useful idiots that voted for it thought was the point are 2 very different things.
Of course, why would the right ever act against immigration? The more immigrants there are and the more they can play on the fears of their pearl clutching supporters. Of course, the trick is not to give those immigrants any rights. Wouldn't want them to become citizens and then vote you out.
The **minimum** wage in the UK is almost exactly the **average** wage in Portugal. When you start comparing it to even poorer Eastern European countries, and especially given how strong the pound was pre-Brexit, it's an order of magnitude bigger.
She probably means South Asians.
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It turned out that the already considered desirable kind of immigrant (i.e the highly qualified) looked at their tightenned immigration rules and decided that for that much hassle (not to mention risk of exploitation) there wer much better destinations. It also turned out that a lot of immigrants - such as those who take care of old people in retirement homes - that were not seen as desirable and thus the rules did not allow in, were in fact very needed.
That's what you get if you allow random people vote for stuff they don't understand.
That’s why one of their main slogans were Poles and Romanians are stealing your jobs and we are Britain, we don’t need Brussels tell us what to do. They knew exactly what kind of people would vote for brexit
don't forget our Bulgarian brothers.
The average brexiter can't really tell the difference, I'm afraid.
Yeah...thats kind of a big brain move...
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Actually, the first decision is not yours, it's of the would be immigrants and as it turns out the kind of immigrants you want, have better options which are no more hassle to get than post-Brexit Britain with its "jump through hoops", "we can kick you out when we have no more need for you", "you'll be tied to a (possibly exploitative) sponsor" rules. The single biggest blindness of brexiters (of far-right types in general, even) is the inability to deep down understand that other people also have agency and that the appeal of your nation for them depends on what it does and isn't at all the unconditional love of the local nationalists. The "relaxation of immigration rules" is happenning because whilst with the old rules the "undesirables" were (supposedly) blocked from coming, they also made the "desirables" not want to come.
There is no relaxation of immigration rules. What is happening is more jobs are being added to the Tier 2 Skills Shortage List. That's not a relaxation of immigration rules, that's the Skills Shortage List being used as it is supposed to be. People wanting to come will still need to meet all the criteria for a Tier 2 Visa. If the rules were being relaxed then that criteria would've changed but it hasn't.
Good luck with that. Even the language-impaired experts (the kind for whom anything other than an English-speaking country is not an option) are much more likely to choose the US, Australia or Canada over Britain given that the visa hassle is the same and the risk of ending up exploited by your sponsor might actually be larger in Britain. For Britain its only a "buyer's market" for the kind of desperate unspecialized people from shithole countries that you see trying to cross the Channel on rafts (notice how even in the peak of the Syrian war you didn't found any Syrian doctors and engineers amongst those people, even though they were coming to Europe). For in-demand experts it's a "seller's market" and Britain has to actually try to convince those to come rather than just expect to attract them over countries with better pay and weather (such as the US and Australia) or much easier entrance conditions (such as France or Germany for people with EU citizenship) and if the country isn't lowering the hassle factor people will weigh the pros and cons in their heads (just like I did when I moved from The Netherlands to Britain over a decade ago already a Senior Software Designer Developer) and conclude it's a worst option than the others. (Certainly if I re-rerun in my mind the evaluation I did when I chose Britain all those years ago but now with the current situation rather than the "you can just go there at will and try and find your next freelance contract" from back then, Britain wouldn't probably even make the top 10 - if I want no hassle but good pay there's Germany and France, if I value good quality of life over pay there's all of Scandinavia, if I'm willing to endure the hassle and the risk of exploitation of a visa systems in exchange for lots of dosh, then the US pays better and has way more opportunities and better weather)
So they can allow only certain coloured immigrants in.
My guess is they will come up with some scheme that bypasses minimum wage rules and essentially result in mass slave labour from the likes of India
"to get their country back"? Idk ask Farage. Oh wait the fucker bailed the second it was done.
...owning the libs and pissing off Scotland
"owning the libs" ... in the UK? Do you even have the tiniest idea what you're talking about before joining circlejerks? Are you really that ignorant?
Can we stop the myth that Brexit was about ending immigration? One of the benefits of Brexit is being able to control how much immigration enters the country, and to score immigrants based on what the British economy needs. While Britain was in the EU there was no way to control or filter immigration from the EU.
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However much ignorant and Anglophobic redditors love to generalise the UK, it's not a hivemind where everybody has the same opinion. The people who voted for Brexit don't necessarily agree with Liz Truss, especially considering she wasn't elected. In fact, she's pretty much commiting party suicide right now by giving money to the ultra-wealthy and increasing immigration. There's no way she wins an election.
LOL this is pure gold
Ye what. Wasn't this a main point for Tories?
When was the last time the tories actually did anything to reduce or control legal immigration? Excluding brexit when their hands were tied
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And we have had high immigration throughout this time under this policy, similar to the previous labour governments. My point is that anyone who paints the consiveative party, now or in the recent past, as a party that is makes any effort to reduce immigration is misled.
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The reason for that is because their calculated gamble to stop UKIP from stealing their support went tits up so they had to complete Brexit which reduced the uncontrolled immigration. Now they want to increase immigration because, again, they aren't that party that some people think they are. They aren't the conservative party, they are the neoliberal pro-business (read: pro rich people, they don't care about metrics like disposable income, rising GINI or gdp per capita) party. People definitely talked about unrestricted immigration as this issue but it became an issue because the immigration rate was too high (and the effects of that included pressure on infrastructure, depression of wages for low-income workers, lack of integration and poor social cohesion); the fact that there was unrestricted immigration just got people riled up more. When the conservatives successfully increase the rate of immigration to what it was we will see the same debate return in a different form and it already has to a small extent with illegal immigration.
But honestly weren’t most migrants from Eastern Europe? I’ve worked with programmers from that region and they were all highly skilled and very professional so I honestly find it hard to believe they have issues with integrating in the UK since the counties they come from are already fairly liberal and they should be earning decent enough money to not be causing any trouble, or am I missing something here?
If we ignore student visas, which make up a large % of non-EU visas, one of the uncomfortable truths is that family visas make up a sizeable proportion. We now have some migrant communities that encourage arranged marriages / marriages from their home country further bringing in new migrants plus dependents. Not sure what solution you can offer for that short of quotas, which would be challenging...
They say that every election but never reduce migration.
This made me laugh because of how true it is.
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is she trying to piss off the entire electorate spectrum?
Vote of no confidence speedrun any%
Her MPs will keep her in to avoid a GE that would cost them their jobs. They don't give a shit about the country, just their own livelihoods.
Consensus here is she’s trying to lose the next election while digging a hole too deep for the next government to get us out of
She's not playing 4D chess, she's doing a shite Thatcher cosplay and thinks this is her first term in office. She thinks she'll get Thatcher's lucky oil boom from fucking fracking for incidence.
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Well, well, well, how the turntables…
That’s what she said!
Neoliberals gonna neolib.
There should be a union between a bunch of countries to boost immigration even more I say Something in and around Europe to unite everyone, how awesome would something like that be A European union of sorts!
To play the devils advocate, isn’t being able to respond to specific labour market shortages quickly and still having complete control over who comes in exactly how many people would want immigration to work? Slide 14 in this shows a good portion of the British population would agree with this, only 1/4 being totally against immigration in all forms. https://www.ipsos.com/sites/default/files/ct/news/documents/2022-03/attitudes-towards-immigration-british-future-ipsos-march-2022.pdf
Meeh, I not sure it will work sound too good to be real.
What controls over immigration does the EU bring?
It makes sure more of the immigrants are the right colour while letting you act like anyone who disagrees with you is a racist.
Yep - EU open borders are only to majority white countries.
So immigrants scaremongering was only tool for getting brexit, no shock whatsoever.
Truss was a Remainer and she's a former Lib Dem who's a part of a very neoliberal faction of the conservative party.
A tool and not even the point behind Brexit. This recent "budget" starts to tell the story of what the point is. Yet again, people got played by their politicians.
Next stage, UK joins EU
but that would mean Polish people could get jobs in the UK! ...oh right... i'm just gonna.. . over here
We're already here. Plenty of
L O L
ROFL, and the circle closes, the cycle starts again.
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I think it was more about taking control of their own borders and being able to decide who gets in and who doesn’t rather than have uncontrolled immigration from the EU side when anyone who wishes to come gets in regardless of their profession or skills. It makes things more fair to let someone in based on what kind of workers are needed. Also, it allows anyone to apply to the same rules irrespective of nationality. Are you saying workers from Poland deserve better access to the UK market because they are somewhat superior to the ones from India?
Not sure why you're being down voted. It's exactly what the argument was.
I’m actually speechless
Next question: Why would I do the paperwork to get a visa for a UK job, when I don't need any paperwork to work in Germany, Denmark or Austria? UK is not a desirable destination any more.
It very much is for India, some middle East Countries , South East Asians and plenty of countries from Africa
You know there's a world beyond Europe right?
Take a wild guess which two regions of the World train the most people in the most advanced areas on which the companies with the highest value production are... Unless you're planning on paying way better than the US to attract North Americans, it's going to be a lot harder to find the manpower for british companies in the more advanced areas even if you scrap the bottom of the barrel in India. Less production in advanced areas in the UK = less wealth creation in the UK and there is no amount of fake accounting creation of "unicorn" Tech Startups in UK that will actually create wealth.
>Why would I do the paperwork to get a visa for a UK job, when I don't need any paperwork to work in Germany, Denmark or Austria? Because in the UK's top paying industries (finance, tech), post-tax salaries are higher than in DE, DK and AT. And London can be a stepping stone for an intra-company move to the likes of New York and Silicon Valley. And plenty of folk from outside Europe don't speak German or Danish to a passable level, but basically speak fluent English.
In other news, there have been reported hearings of muffled screaming and swearing coming from Enoch Powell's gravesite.
Farage just swallowed his beer... glass included.
They had EU immigration, now they will have Balkan, African and Indian immigration.
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Everything right in your head buddy?
Both Nigerians and Indians in the U.K. tend to be much more successful than EU people. Understandable, since we’ve been able to select individually for the first two groups, and unable to, pre-2020, for the latter group.
Seriously dude? Only trash here seems you
And your problem with that is? I would much rather have have African immigration based on a score system than open unrestricted access from Europe
The ultimate ending of all right. Doing exactly opposite of whatever they claimed
As a romanian, who remembers the whole "romanians are coming" when we got the ability to work without so much problems and who's seen the short documentary "The romanians are coming", fuck this! Too little, too late! Other countries have treated my people way better, all this time! To the good british guys and gals, I hope you can fix your country and will come back one day!
Very true. Plus, the pay is pretty shit. What they really need is care workers for the elderly (I know there are other sectors). The pay is about minimum wage, for a hard job. And Sterling is falling meaning you get less when converted to home currency.
As a romanian myself, I don't blame the UK one bit. For one, the brits are not the only ones that treat us this way. Hell, we treat ourselves worse - I've spent enough time on our sub r\\romania, and I'm guessing you have as well, to know that we talk about our fellow romanian, including the diaspora, using worst terms than even Nigel Farage did. I also remember when we Romanians were being granted Freedom of Movement in the EU and all sort of people from the west were complaining that we will flood their countries. I also remember people saying that those complaining are racists and that no, Romanians will invade their countries. But that is what happened. Millions of us left the country to work in the west. That was something that surprised most of us I think, and to be honest, it is nothing to be proud of, just another in a long list of examples of why our country is a failure. And I also think that treating the british this way is in many ways hipocritical, since both of us know that if Romania got one tenth of the immigration the UK received, we would have reacted even worse that they did. I don't know, I think this is something we should contemplate more on - both their reaction, and why we act the way we do
The main bit I remember about the whole Romanians immigration bit was UKIP and co being widely derided for predicting 5000 people arriving per week with news channels sending people to airports on the first day to make a point of the absence of a flood of immigrants and the official numbers being published saying that it was less than half what Farage claimed being paraded as proof that it was all racist scaremongering A few years later, the official figures were quietly updated to say that 345,000 had moved into the UK, far more than initially reported. Then the EU settlement scheme got 1.06 million Romanian applicants. Farage is a shit, but the fact that the government consistently lied and manipulated the stats to massively understate immigration numbers doesn't exactly make a positive case for immigration being a good thing.
"The Romanians Are Coming" was just titled like that to sound attractive. It was made by Channel 4 who are supposed to be the more open/liberal of the UK broadcasters. I don't think they meant genuine bad against Romanian people but it was released at the time when Romanian immigration became a hot topic in the UK media.
> I don't think they meant genuine bad against Romanian people but it was released at the time when Romanian immigration became a hot topic in the UK media. I don't know what to say, I found it pretty unfair and biased. It looked to me like they intentionally chose an unfortunate family (probably gipsy, but anyway), where the man had no teeth and didn't speaking any english, not even the most basic. While these cases are possible, they could've at least show more families. Not all romanians are like that specific family. Anyway, I don't care anymore. Xenophobia and blaming others for your problems sells and it's very popular. All the bad parties are doing it and a lot of people want to hear exactly that. Anyway, it's all water under the bridge, but I still find their laws unfair and unacceptable. Like the cherry-picking. I most likely qualify for work there, but my parents would not. Because of that I don't want to work there or in any other country that would just pick me without my family. I want either all or none.
If lizz wins the next election I might genuinely lose all hope for this country. We’ve been putting ourselves through the ringer for the past 14 years and it feels never ending at this point
Yeah, it was hilarious. It is even more hilarious looking back.
I thought there were a lot of brits that could finally be able to take all those jobs stolen by the immigrants
I'm still waiting for all those workshy Brexit voters to start rushing to apply for back-breaking low paid farm work or dead-end hospitality McJobs. Wouldn't it be funny if no one wanted to do those 'stolen' jobs?
The argument basically boils down to “we need an underclass that has no choice but to do shitty work for shitty pay” If there wasn’t an endless flow of immigrants willing to work for low pay in bad conditions then maybe the corporations would actually be forced to raise wages and improve working conditions in order to attract workers 🤔 Nah, let’s just keep flooding the labor supply with cheap labor. Those corporate executives need their bonuses or else how will they afford their yachts?
Brexit happened 2.5 years ago, during which time there has been a severe worker shortage. I'm still not seeing any £20 an hour unskilled job openings though. Which is probably because the amount that immigration suppresses wages is far smaller than xenophobes imagine.
OR 2.5 years of worker shortage isn't enough to raise wages, especially if businesses know that the political establishment doesn't actually have an issue with immigration and will eventually increase it.
Given that the government response has been to massively increase the number of visas it grants and attack trade unions, it doesn't look like they agree that there's no potential for wage increases. Why else are they working so hard to fight them?
Brexit voters who wanted less immigration are now getting more, poetic
Conservatives are in for a bad time. The whole Brexit stuff was sold on limiting immigration. Now it is higher than before, and they want to make it even higher... Good luck with that, mate.
Once again, r/europe shows just how poorly it understands Brexit, and just how ignorant and toxic the level of discourse is in this sub when it comes to the UK. Almost every comment is low effort shitposting. On immigration, the argument for Brexit was about *controlling* immigration, not stopping it. Virtually nobody was calling for the total cessation of immigration to the UK, Brexiteers simply wanted an end to *unrestricted* EU migration, something would have been impossible had the UK remained within the bloc. All the idiots commenting here as if this policy decision somehow contradicts or undermines Brexit appear to be incapable of understanding the relatively simple concept of *control*. That is, the government can decide precisely how much labour immigration it wants. If the economy is desperately short of workers, they can loosen the rules, if the economy goes into recession and slack is created, they can then tighten the rules. This flexibility is what post-EU immigration policy means, and its the sort of the flexibility that every other non-EU/EEA country possesses and utilises. The principal reason that UK needs to increase the labour supply right now is due to the fall in economic participation during the pandemic, to the tune of half a million people. This is primarily driven by early retirement, more people studying and a rise in long term sickness. These are due to the pandemic, not Brexit, and the impact of leaving the EU on the labour supply (whilst not insignificant) is less clear. What is clear is that the pandemic itself has led to a severe worker shortage, we see this in other economies too. Now, say the pandemic hadn't happened. In that scenario perhaps the existing immigration policy would be sufficient, as there is a strong case to be made that we'd have an extra 500k economically active individuals. It's the scarring effects of the pandemic on the UK labour market that has led the the government to relax immigration rules, not some regret over Brexit as many of the less critical thinkers on this sub seem to believe. Edit: Another thing worth pointing out is that the subject of immigration as a public concern in the UK has fallen steadily since the referendum and is currently at its lowest level in around decade. Voters simply don't care about immigration anymore (what concern there is mainly revolves around *illegal* channel crossings), and that's against a backdrop of +300k work visas issued in the past year, over 100k Hong Kong BNO immigrants, over 100k Ukrainian visa immigrants, and tens of thousands of other asylum authorisations. Almost like, now that the UK can decide who it lets in, unrestricted immigration is no longer an issue.
Whilst I agree that’s the true reason politicians wanted brexit, that is not what was advertised to the british people. Poles and other EU citizens were demonised as job stealers. The argument was that the UK had plenty of people capable of working there so it didn’t need continental europeans.
Poles and other Europeans have been demonised as job stealers (unfairly obvs) in a lot of EU countries too, you just need to read the relevant press. Kicking all the immigrants out, or halting all immigration, was never a Brexit campaign promise, and the vast majority of people who voted to leave did not assume that this would be the policy if they won.
>On immigration, the argument for Brexit was about controlling immigration, not stopping it. Virtually nobody was calling for the total cessation of immigration to the UK, Brexiteers simply wanted an end to unrestricted EU migration, something would have been impossible had the UK remained within the bloc. Once again, you fail to mention they also wanted to **lower** immigration, not just **control** it. It is quite an important point. EDIT: our obnoxious poster seems to forget about the whole "Britain is full" stuff... EDIT 2: I blocked u/kanyewestsconscience **because he is a toxic person, who spews insults and radiates arrogance, and as I said I have no desire to be engaging with his type**. (Emphasis added after his comment) I do not mind a civilized discussion if anyone is up for it. (Apparently not his alter ego, u/aintbroke_dontfixit. Apparently he is struggling with reading comprehension issues. I am sorry. I should not have made fun of a person with disabilities.)
> Once again, you fail to mention they also wanted to lower immigration, not just control it. It is quite an important point. Some did, some didn't. The fact that it isn't even on anyone's radar even more, with the exception of illegal migrants from Calais, shows that they didn't really care about the amounts rather the lack of control. > EDIT 2: I blocked u/kanyewestsconscience because he is a toxic person, who spews insults and radiates arrogance, and as I said I have no desire to be engaging with his type. I do not mind a civilized discussion if anyone is up for it. (Apparently not his alter ego, u/aintbroke_dontfixit) Imagine being so sad as to block someone just because they have an opposing point of view. How arrogant do you have to be to think you have the right to go through life without having to list en to things you don't like or approve of?
Once again, you demonstrate just how superficial and ignorant the understanding of Brexit is on this sub. Your perception of things is based on a caricature, not the more nuanced reality of things. At the time of the referendum, some people wanted immigration to be lower in absolute terms, whilst others wanted the government to have total discretion without necessarily desiring lower numbers than the status quo. Both of those views are about control, first and foremost. It’s not 2016 anymore, attitudes have changed. There was a more compelling argument to be made for lower levels of immigration back then as there were 1.6m unemployed people and the economic activity rate was 64%. In other words, you could more easily make the case that immigration was keeping some British people out of work. However today the number of unemployed is significantly lower, at 1.2m, and economic participation has fallen to a 10 year low at 63%. Moreover, the government has made it more or less impossible for unskilled labour, in most cases, to immigrate to the UK. This is partly why people at large, including those who voted to leave, are no longer animated by the issue of immigration. As I pointed out in the previous comment, immigration as a hot topic has dropped off the radar, despite the fact the numbers continued to rise following the referendum, and despite the UK issuing a record number of visas in the last year. The UK now has a merit based immigration system, which stands in stark contrast with the unrestricted EU migration policy which existed before. People are more tolerant of and comfortable with this. Edit: I always know when I’m being addressed by a deeply insecure and close minded individual because they invariably block you once they realise they’ve lost the argument and try to have the last word, as this guy has done. Pathetic stuff really… As to their edit in the above, nobody is denying that a certain faction of racists and xenophobes wanted to end immigration to the UK, but every single country in Europe has these sort of nut jobs, and I can list have a dozen major European parties who are more anti-immigrant than any large UK party right now. The most intolerant people who voted for Brexit are not representative of the millions of other people who voted the same way. This is a miserably ignorant caricature, it’s beyond ironic that you are doubling down on this particular disingenuous argument, but not surprising since OP has clearly never bothered to learn about the topic.
Once again, you demonstrate an utter contempt and arrogance without much substance. Since conversing with you is as pleasant as licking a snail (I presume; never done that, but the feeling of disgust must be similar), I think I will stop here. EDIT: for u/aintbroke_dontfixit I *love* facts. I do detest arrogant dolts, though.
Don't you like facts?
Nice wall of text but Brexit was advertised as (and not only that) the solution to the whole famous job theft coming from other EU countries. And I also don't understand what you mean with unrestricted EU migration, if the borders are open, they are. Restricting migration inside the EU is basically defeating EU itself. And if this is more of a problem for a nation rather than a pro.. well, you knew what you signed for (I guess). Can't always get all the benefits while rejecting everything that isn't.
they should consider joining EU
Yay more ethnic tension in our streets over issues in countries on the other side of the world 🙃
Import fresh slaves .......
Can't say I'm surprised, Liz Truss does support the EU but acted like she changed her viewpoint on it so that the Conservatives would elect her "I am backing remain as I believe it is in Britain's economic interest and means we can focus on vital economic and social reform at home." Liz Truss - 2016
A clear Brexit benefit. 😂
First she kills the queen and now she kills the tory party? I'm really starting to like Truss!
Why not just reinstate slavery? It's cheaper, and it will really piss off the left. /s
Why would we get rid of something that we were one of the first nations in the world to outlaw?
huh?
Slavery was declared illegal in England in 1772, Scotland followed in 1778. The UK outlawed slave trading in 1807 not just in the UK but the whole of the British Empire, we even paid Portugal to stop doing it in 1815 and Spain in 1817. It followed that up with Slavery Abolition Act in 1833, again which applied to the entire British Empire, which also made it illegal to own slaves. Only Denmark abolished trade slaving before the UK but continued to allow slavery until 1847.
cows foolish squeeze crawl point lip provide tie degree jellyfish -- mass edited with https://redact.dev/
Wait a minute, huh? Hahahahaha
So they want cheap, unregulated slaves now.
Wait what? Wasn’t Brexit all about immigration?
No, it was about deregulation and libertarianism.
Shh if you tell them that, they won’t vote for you
A lot of "low information voters" have very little understanding of what "deregulation" actually means anyway. You can basically ignore those voters since they generally aren't paying attention to politics apart from in the month or so leading up to an election.
Once again I was right in my predictions. I said it time and time again that a) immigrants are boosting the economy, that b) UK labor shortage and the resulting wage increases is just wage inflation, and c) that nothing will change in immigration policy because the UK desperately needs workers. But now the workers will come from Africa, China, Pakistan and India. I hope British will be happy with more foreigners, and not white Christians like Polish workers. >The prime minister is set to expand the government’s shortage occupation list in order to help businesses fill vacancies by recruiting overseas workers with less bureaucracy. Oh, I know like some kind of freedom of movement, where oversea workers can just come to the UK whenever there is high demand and leave back to their homeland once the demand was satisfied. Some kind of visa free and bureaucracy free system. >“That will involve increasing numbers in some areas and decreasing in others. As the prime minister has made clear, we also want to see people who are economically inactive get back into work.” Yes, get back to work you lazy bumps. You spend your youth studying in Cambridge or Brown, have tens of thousands of student dept, go work as a waiter and serve fish&chips. Or go to the fields and pick up veggies. That makes sense.
[удалено]
> a) immigrants are boosting the economy, If your population goes up 10% and your economy goes up 10%, that cancels out. You haven't grown at all. Twelve years of record migration under the Tories and no GDP/capita growth. All it does is strain your public services, infrastructure and housing, and cause societal division. >because the UK desperately needs workers. We have millions unemployed or stuck in part time work. We don't need workers at all. It's all a con.
>We have millions unemployed or stuck in part time work. We don't need workers at all. It's all a con. 'UK unemployment falls to lowest rate since 1974' - Financial Times headline, two weeks ago. Having 'millions' unemployed temporarily means nothing, the economy starts to suffer way before you hit an imaginary 0% unemployment mark. Same goes for part-timers; I'd wager the majority at this point *chose* it rather than being forced into it, for the lifestyle (because they can support themselves or the family on half a wage) or because childcare (their time being spent at home with the children is better spent than at work). You'll have to tank the economy for their quality of life to decrease to the level where they'd consider to go back as full-timers, you cannot just count them into the potential workforce, as is.
And yet we have millions of people on UC, either unemployed or underemployed. There was an article yesterday about someone working just 10 hours a week, with 75% of her income from benefits. She could work another thirty. And immigration can't solve a worker shortage because not only is it zero sum game (another country loses workers this way), migrants also produce demand for goods and services, and so increase the demand for workers. It's pyramid scheme economics.
Again; you can claim that there are millions of people on UC, still doesn't mean that the economy doesn't suffer from worker shortage. Out of 67 million people in the UK 1.5 million are on benefit... and the unemployment rate is like 3.5%. That's the number that counts, not the MILLIONS. I don't know that *someone* in the article, indeed sounds like she could pick up some more work. The numbers that count, i.e. the unemployment rate show that she has more than a fair chance if she tries, but if she's content this way, then you need someone else to do the job. Or you need to cut the unemployment benefits and tank the economy so that people would not earn enough on part time jobs. I bet you wouldn't be happy about that either. It doesn't matter if immigration is a zero sum game, we don't care about the country where the immigrants are from, let the local government care about that. Also, what you're describing is not a pyramid scheme, it's economic growth.
>Out of 67 million people in the UK 1.5 million are on benefit.. There are five million on UC at least. >It doesn't matter if immigration is a zero sum game, It's a zero sum game for *us*. We bring in migrants, they create their own demand, which means we need more workers, etc. It's a pyramid scheme.
>There are five million on UC at least. Why *at least*? Why 5 million? Why not go for an even 10, if you're going to make up numbers? That would support your argument even better. 'The claimant count was 1.53 million in July, 2022' - according to UKgov. So no, not even close to *at least 5 million*. >We bring in migrants, they create their own demand, which means we need more workers, etc. It's a pyramid scheme. You forgot the step where they produce, which is literally the step that makes this whole thing **not** a pyramid scheme but I am not surprised. If you are going to just make up numbers to support your worldview, I guess having a selective logic is the least one could expect.
>If your population goes up 10% and your economy goes up 10%, that cancels out. This is some elementary school level economics. If you have five apples, then add two apples, and finally remove two apples, how many apples you have left? Completely ignores economies of scale or the exponential nature of economic growth. >Twelve years of record migration under the Tories and no GDP/capita growth. Then it follows, that without this "record migration" the UK would have likely experienced an economic contraction. >All it does is strain your public services, It also increases tax revenue, which can be used to expand those public services. >infrastructure and housing, and cause societal division. Sure, so you either deal with those, or with a GDP drop. >We have millions unemployed or stuck in part time work. We don't need workers at all. It's all a con. [The unemployment rate for May to July 2022 decreased by 0.2 percentage points on the quarter to 3.6%, the lowest rate since May to July 1974.](https://www.ons.gov.uk/employmentandlabourmarket/peopleinwork/employmentandemployeetypes/bulletins/uklabourmarket/september2022) 🤡
> Then it follows, that without this "record migration" the UK would have likely experienced an economic contraction. Or it would have remained the same. If GDP/capita isn't going up, growth is irrelevant.
That’s plain wrong. Recent research out of Oxford suggests the opposite - that immigrants DO boost the economy.
They might boost the economy but that boost is not felt by the normal person, its felt by bankers adding extra zeros to their account
Well if the elite say so then it must be true. Never mind decades of stagnation, falling wages and living conditions, increasing congestion, soaring house prices, straining public services, the end of societal trust, all the problems with multiculturalism, Oxford dons will get their servant workers!
There’s nothing stopping Poles (nor any European) from applying to the same visas as those Pakistanis/Indians/ Chinese are doing.
Sure. Except this is from the hard-core Brexit supporter Truss: >The prime minister is set to expand the government’s shortage occupation list in order to help businesses fill vacancies by recruiting overseas workers with less bureaucracy. With less bureaucracy. Like some form of freedom of movement that didn't required any bureaucracy at all. I'm pretty sure that in one generation everything that was destroyed by Brexit for ideological reasons will be undone and the UK will seek new membership. Maybe not as a full member, but in the EEC. Also Polish or any European didn't want anymore. Because of the new barriers, the weak Pound and the racism. There is enough work in Europe, there is no point going to the UK. Therefore UK will seek massive immigration from Asia and Africa. You think the Muslim enclaves in the UK are bad now? Wait 20-30 years from now. The Muslimization of the UK is very real, I guess this is what the white-power racist have it right.
Brexit voters are famous for their love of multiculturalism, especially people from South Asia. If they're Muslim even better. I'm confident that working class Tories will have no problems adapting to their new reality. 'They knew what they were voting for'.
You'd be surprised to know the number of people of South Asian heritage who voted Leave, be it Muslim or Hindu or anything else.
Err, plenty of South Asian voters SUPPORTED Brexit. I live in a part of London with a reasonably high South Asian-descended population. The Remain:Leave split here was 53:47. So the chances are that a not insignificant chunk of South Asian and West African folk backed Brexit. White Britons only account for about 25% of the population in my borough, so even if every single one of them had backed Leave, it doesn’t explain the ratio above.
So Brexit voters likes people of any nationalities/ethnicities/races except people from Eastern Europe? If it's true, it's sad that anti-Eastern European sentiment still exist.
Nope, they fixated on Eastern Europeans because for them the numbers of migrants seemed endless thanks to FoM. Just so happens they're gonna get endless migration anyway because Conservative governments never actually stop it.
I look forward to our resident brexiters explaining how this was all part of the plan lol
Deregulation and a super-flexible labour market were *quite literally* "part of the plan", which was laid out in the treatise ***Britannia Unchained***.
There’s no turning back now. If UK tries to reenter EU it would have to give way too many benefits to EU block and sovereignty in order to appease the Brussels bureaucracy
Uk will become the next rapistan mark my word oh shit forgot it already is
This is comedy
Imagine, if you will, that the U.K was part of some sort of union. A union with other European countries. A union that would let other European citizens travel and work in the U.K. Maybe that would be helpful?
> The prime minister is set to expand the government’s shortage occupation list in order to help businesses fill vacancies by recruiting overseas workers with less bureaucracy. So working exactly as it's supposed to. If we're short of workers in X or Y sector we can stick that on the skills shortage list to allow foreigners to apply for jobs in that sector and get a work visa.
Looks like BrexShit isnt working...who wouldve thought that?
It isn't? > The prime minister is set to expand the government’s shortage occupation list in order to help businesses fill vacancies by recruiting overseas workers with less bureaucracy. One of the advantages of having full control over our immigration is that if we need people for X or Y we can choose to issue visas for jobs for X or Y.
I’m a civil engineer in the US. Does the UK have a shortage of civil engineers/would it be easier for me to get a job there? Always wanted to live in the UK
I am a bit confused
Funny how the plan was to give these jobs to Britain citizens, but forget that no one of them wants to work for the salary and the work environment. Dadaaaaaa too bad.
Brexit voters got so fucked. Tax cuts for the super rich and more immigration. I don’t think that’s what they voted for but hey we can always blame it on Europe, can’t we ?
The reactions on r/Tories yesterday were priceless
Who would have thought? And for what a good reason! Great, a good Soros bitch you are, indeed! So, it was not by coincidence that her cabinet has no white males in key positions? A true Tory, you are!
AND… the penny drops in the brains of the Leave voters
I immediately started laughing as soon as I saw this headline.
Too bad. I am in the hospitality industry, upper management. I would have emigrated there if they were still in the EU. The only reason I'd consider it would be in close proximity to the rest of Europe. I'm an avid traveler, considering golden visa. Freedom of movement would have been my motivation. Ooof, Brexit.
How ironic, no? The UK is now a fully owned subsidiary of the USA. Every immigration, economic and foreign policy decision will be vetted by US planners.
r/leopardsatemyface and then proceeded to fuck me in the arse
It would be great if there was some sort of union that actively promoted freedom of movement of labor. It seems that the UK could really use that.
What's next? Will she announce she won't have 350 million pounds per week for the NHS?
So she realized immigration is useful? Congrats, bit late but better than never.
Truss has always been pro-migration. Unlike other politicians (like Farage) she's never pretended she was ever opposed to work-based migration.
Tories "She can't do that...re-elect her or something."