Election

[Herlock Sholmes]

Hi Herlock,

Everything you list here as what people 'want' costs money, but if those same people want tax cuts, rather than tax rises, they ain't gonna get what they want - or what they need.

First on my wish list would be the renationalisation of our water and sewage services.

Second would be to reverse Brexit - but sadly it will take a brave politician to go down that road and why the hell would the EU want us back?

Love,

Caz
X

Hi Caz,

Plus our genius of a PM is now expecting us to pay to send illegal immigrants to Rwanda at £20,000+ per immigrant. Call me Mr. Negative but I see no cause for optimism. This country is pretty much dead on its feet. I pity the young who have to grow and bring children up in it.

I Can’t help thinking of Dad’s Army……”we’re all dooooomed!”

[caz]

And right on cue, Nigel Farage is taking over the Loony Toony "Reform UK" party, which I think is his fourth incarnation of "sticking it to the establishment" of which is so badly wants to be part of. So badly, he will even stand in a ward that he has never heard of and where he's never been and has no intention of moving there either.

Just so he can keep that supply of fags going.

As a reason for his change of heart is his perception "that the country is in moral decline" (as if he's the cure for that...) and that "we have forgotten who we are as a country" ,a platitude so empty of actual meaning it is danger of being used as a vacuum chamber by scientists.

If you substitute a shorter word beginning with c which almost rhymes with 'country', you will see that it's Farage himself who needs to examine his own morals, and Farage who is forgetting who - and what - he is.

Who 'we' are as a 'country' doesn't even make sense and would not be for Farage to judge in any case.

Love,

Caz
X

[caz]

Hi Caz,

Plus our genius of a PM is now expecting us to pay to send illegal immigrants to Rwanda at £20,000+ per immigrant. Call me Mr. Negative but I see no cause for optimism. This country is pretty much dead on its feet. I pity the young who have to grow and bring children up in it.

I Can’t help thinking of Dad’s Army……”we’re all dooooomed!”

Hi Herlock,

The thing is, these immigrants are automatically deemed 'illegal' where there is no facility for them to claim refugee status and have their cases judged in the UK. It's worse than being presumed guilty unless you can prove your innocence. I would keep them here and give them paid work while their cases are being assessed, so they pay tax, contribute to our economy and don't have the same incentive to abscond. It's not as if there is a mad scramble for every job vacancy. Here in Devon, there are plenty of job opportunities but far too few applicants. It's an insane situation to throw good money at deterring 'foreigners' when we don't have enough workers here as it is.

My great grandmother was French and came over to England as a baby. I wonder how far Farage would like to go back to get rid of people who are only enjoying the fruits of living in the UK today due to having an immigrant in their relatively recent family history.

Love,

Caz
X

[Ms Diddles]

Hi Herlock,

The thing is, these immigrants are automatically deemed 'illegal' where there is no facility for them to claim refugee status and have their cases judged in the UK. It's worse than being presumed guilty unless you can prove your innocence. I would keep them here and give them paid work while their cases are being assessed, so they pay tax, contribute to our economy and don't have the same incentive to abscond. It's not as if there is a mad scramble for every job vacancy. Here in Devon, there are plenty of job opportunities but far too few applicants. It's an insane situation to throw good money at deterring 'foreigners' when we don't have enough workers here as it is.

My great grandmother was French and came over to England as a baby. I wonder how far Farage would like to go back to get rid of people who are only enjoying the fruits of living in the UK today due to having an immigrant in their relatively recent family history.

Love,

Caz
X

Great Post Caz!

I completely agree.

The current system which prevents asylum seekers from working serves to keep vulnerable people in poverty and prevents them from properly integrating and contributing to the economy.

I have worked in the asylum process previously, and for the last decade in homelessness / social housing and I can state with absolute certainly that things are not at all as portrayed in the populist media.

Very few asylum seekers are economic migrants. The vast majority are fleeing circumstances which are so horrific it's hard for us to comprehend.

With very few exceptions they are keen to integrate and will start looking for work as soon as they are granted leave to remain and have completed their ESOL course.

They are often willing to accept minimum-wage, zero-hour contract jobs that the indigenous population won't touch.

They often bring a variety of skills (I have worked with doctors, nurses, human rights lawyers, journalists even someone who played for their national football team and now coaches kids here).

The NHS is on it's knees and we are desperate for doctors, nurses and other specialists.

Yes, there is the odd person who wants to remain on benefits and has no interest in integrating, but they are few and far between.

The Daily Mail and similar (sewage) outlets would have us believe that this is typical.

It's not. They lie.

There are no easy remedies to the various crises facing the UK, but I would postulate that immigration could be a large part of the solution, not part of the problem.

[caz]

Well said, Ms Diddles!

I worked for the Immigration Department back in the 1980s, but if anyone asks me twice what I actually did there - apart from volunteering to check the waste paper bins regularly for suspicious packages - I assume I'd still have to report it!

I can't for the life of me think why anyone would want to survive on benefits if they had any other options. A few years ago I looked after my late ma-in-law for five years on just the pitiful carer's allowance [then around £60 a week] and my savings, until my former home could be sold and my pensions started kicking in, and it was bloody tough.

This obsession with immigrant numbers is just another facet of Brexit, and reflects the fear and loathing of foreigners, whipped up to a feeding frenzy by certain sections of the media. It's pathetic and dangerous.

Love,

Caz
X

[String]

thought this was good

[String]

https://youtu.be/X3xA7-qfdik?si=qQli7q48nQhxeuIk

reminds me of something….

[String]

Well what’s the betting on the Tories getting less than 100 seats.

[Geddy2112]

Well what’s the betting on the Tories getting less than 100 seats.

Will it make any difference? The rich will get richer, the poor will get poorer. The ones that are elected will line their own pockets and not deliver whatever it was they promised prior to the voting.

[Herlock Sholmes]

I don’t think that anyone would accuse me of being reticent about giving my opinion but I have been pondering for days on whether to broach this subject because immigration is always the trickiest of subjects and these days it has become an even more difficult subject to discuss because accusations of racism usually get thrown in fairly early (with a ‘phobe’ or two thrown in for good measure.) I’m 59 this year and a lifelong Labour voter. I’ve never voted for anyone else other than Labour. I voted for Neil Kinnock, Tony Blair (three times) Gordon Brown and Ed Milliband. I didn’t vote for Corbyn (but I didn’t vote for anyone else) and I still haven’t made up my mind whether to vote for Starmer. I won’t be voting Conservative though. I have no problem admitting though that immigration is a very real issue for me. It’s also a very real issue with pretty much every single person that I know and speak to - including immigrants. People have very serious and I think very legitimate concerns which are nothing to do with racism (but I’m not suggesting that racism doesn’t exist of course.)

I understand for example how medical professionals from other countries have helped and continue to help us but most immigrants aren’t medical professionals they are people who will at some point require the help of medical professionals. Our NHS is on its knees, getting a doctor’s appointment is like trying to gain admittance to the Kremlin. A friend of mine took his daughter to A&E the other night (he was born in India btw so an immigrant) and said that it was absolutely teeming with people, almost all of whom spoke no English. Clearly this is just one example but we know that this isn’t in isolation.

The level of immigration that this country has gone through over the years has been at entirely unprecedented levels and we have been seeing, but turning a blind eye, to the effects (which tend to be in working class areas and not the kind of areas that any friend of Jeremy Corbyn might live) I actually know people and I know people that know people in different areas of the country who are afraid to leave their homes after dark. I know someone whose aunt had to leave her home of 40 years because an influx of Romanian immigrants turned the area into a dump with street violence virtually every night. A colleague of my brothers (a woman in her 40’s) visiting her parents in Yorkshire had stones thrown at her and got called names and told that she shouldn’t be walking in a Muslim area. I knew someone who was forced out of her shop by acts of vandalism and threats because she was the last white English shopkeeper in the street and they wanted her out…in England. These aren’t isolated events. Of course the majority of immigrants aren’t like this but we are receiving wave after wave and many just don’t wish to ‘fit in.’

We have whole areas of our country which are no longer recognisable. Is it wrong (or worse, racist) to hold some affection for your own country? I walked along West Bromwich High Street last week. Something that I’ve done thousands of times and there has always been a percentage of immigrants which is great. Different cultures, different products, different people…absolutely no problem. But not now, because it no longer resembles England. It’s a completely foreign country. Even immigrants themselves express a concern and a sadness and I see nothing wrong with these expressions. Would other peoples be happy if their countries became unrecognisable? Would they be happy if their older generation felt as if they had been moved to a foreign land…their reward for years of hard work, abiding by the law and often risking their lives for their country? We could all name countries that wouldn’t meekly accept this. Why have we done exactly that?

Ok, I expect this post might be seen at best as a ‘grumpy old man’ post by someone yearning for a return to a P.G.Wodehouse world or worse the post of someone who dislikes ‘Johnny Foreigner,’ but I promise that it’s not. It’s the post of someone who is genuinely saddened at the irrevocable change and decline of this country. We lost all sense of balance and any concern for consequence when we allowed uncontrolled, mass immigration. And the problem is even worse - in fact it’s frightening. Although I doubt if I’ll be around to see it myself I can only see events becoming a trigger for the real racists to decide to act. It’s a horrible thought and yes it comes from someone who is by nature a pessimist but even pessimists sometimes get it right.

A level of immigration is a good thing which should be welcomed happily by all but we’ve seen an absolutely flood over the years with no control which shows no sign of halting or even of slowing down. The current culture of self-hate, where we are expected to despise every element of our history and our culture is simply the ‘softening up’ process in my opinion. If we can be made to hate our past and our own cultural identity then we won’t miss it as it disappears down the drain and is lost forever.

ps. some will disagree with my opinions and that’s fine but I don’t want to get into debates on this subject. I believe that im right about the present but I really hope that I’m wrong about the future.

[DirectorDave]

The Conservatives conserve nothing.

The Labour Party hates the working class.

The Lib Dems are both illiberal and anti-democratic.

Plaid/SNP puts everyone ahead of the Welsh and Scottish.

[Svensson]

I don’t think that anyone would accuse me of being reticent about giving my opinion but I have been pondering for days on whether to broach this subject because immigration is always the trickiest of subjects and these days it has become an even more difficult subject to discuss because accusations of racism usually get thrown in fairly early (with a ‘phobe’ or two thrown in for good measure.) I’m 59 this year and a lifelong Labour voter. I’ve never voted for anyone else other than Labour. I voted for Neil Kinnock, Tony Blair (three times) Gordon Brown and Ed Milliband. I didn’t vote for Corbyn (but I didn’t vote for anyone else) and I still haven’t made up my mind whether to vote for Starmer. I won’t be voting Conservative though. I have no problem admitting though that immigration is a very real issue for me. It’s also a very real issue with pretty much every single person that I know and speak to - including immigrants. People have very serious and I think very legitimate concerns which are nothing to do with racism (but I’m not suggesting that racism doesn’t exist of course.)

I understand for example how medical professionals from other countries have helped and continue to help us but most immigrants aren’t medical professionals they are people who will at some point require the help of medical professionals. Our NHS is on its knees, getting a doctor’s appointment is like trying to gain admittance to the Kremlin. A friend of mine took his daughter to A&E the other night (he was born in India btw so an immigrant) and said that it was absolutely teeming with people, almost all of whom spoke no English. Clearly this is just one example but we know that this isn’t in isolation.

The level of immigration that this country has gone through over the years has been at entirely unprecedented levels and we have been seeing, but turning a blind eye, to the effects (which tend to be in working class areas and not the kind of areas that any friend of Jeremy Corbyn might live) I actually know people and I know people that know people in different areas of the country who are afraid to leave their homes after dark. I know someone whose aunt had to leave her home of 40 years because an influx of Romanian immigrants turned the area into a dump with street violence virtually every night. A colleague of my brothers (a woman in her 40’s) visiting her parents in Yorkshire had stones thrown at her and got called names and told that she shouldn’t be walking in a Muslim area. I knew someone who was forced out of her shop by acts of vandalism and threats because she was the last white English shopkeeper in the street and they wanted her out…in England. These aren’t isolated events. Of course the majority of immigrants aren’t like this but we are receiving wave after wave and many just don’t wish to ‘fit in.’

We have whole areas of our country which are no longer recognisable. Is it wrong (or worse, racist) to hold some affection for your own country? I walked along West Bromwich High Street last week. Something that I’ve done thousands of times and there has always been a percentage of immigrants which is great. Different cultures, different products, different people…absolutely no problem. But not now, because it no longer resembles England. It’s a completely foreign country. Even immigrants themselves express a concern and a sadness and I see nothing wrong with these expressions. Would other peoples be happy if their countries became unrecognisable? Would they be happy if their older generation felt as if they had been moved to a foreign land…their reward for years of hard work, abiding by the law and often risking their lives for their country? We could all name countries that wouldn’t meekly accept this. Why have we done exactly that?

Ok, I expect this post might be seen at best as a ‘grumpy old man’ post by someone yearning for a return to a P.G.Wodehouse world or worse the post of someone who dislikes ‘Johnny Foreigner,’ but I promise that it’s not. It’s the post of someone who is genuinely saddened at the irrevocable change and decline of this country. We lost all sense of balance and any concern for consequence when we allowed uncontrolled, mass immigration. And the problem is even worse - in fact it’s frightening. Although I doubt if I’ll be around to see it myself I can only see events becoming a trigger for the real racists to decide to act. It’s a horrible thought and yes it comes from someone who is by nature a pessimist but even pessimists sometimes get it right.

A level of immigration is a good thing which should be welcomed happily by all but we’ve seen an absolutely flood over the years with no control which shows no sign of halting or even of slowing down. The current culture of self-hate, where we are expected to despise every element of our history and our culture is simply the ‘softening up’ process in my opinion. If we can be made to hate our past and our own cultural identity then we won’t miss it as it disappears down the drain and is lost forever.

ps. some will disagree with my opinions and that’s fine but I don’t want to get into debates on this subject. I believe that im right about the present but I really hope that I’m wrong about the future.

The "change and decline of this country" is not due to immigrants, it is due several decades of political short-sightedness and greed in general. Decades of cuts to councils and public services inevitably results in town centres (outside of London) turning into scenes from Apocalypse Z. Decades of housing mismanagement resulted in greedy landlords being allowed to charge £1000 for a mould-riddled bedsits. Or £2000 for a 3 bedroom council flat in a highrise somewhere. You say that “whole areas of our country which are no longer recognisable”. Unrecognisable from what? I see that whole areas of the country were basically a shabby shitehole of staggering grimness in the 1980’s and there were very few immigrants in sight. So I see no correlation between social problems and immigrants, I see a correlation between ideology-driven underfunding of public services and deregulation for the sake of capitalism. For example, deregulating building codes may result in more houses being built because the developer can make a bigger buck. Before I left the UK, I lived in a 2-bedroom development near Woking that was built around 1998. We had rising damp, single-glazing, a kitchen he size of a towel and the plaster around the front door coming off all the time. And no, I am not a slammer. I have just seen one like that (same development, exactly the same layout) on the market for more than half a million. Which is just insane.

Regarding the anecdotes above, they are just not backed up by stats. So you have an A&E waiting room where no one spoke English to each other? Is the suggestion that all of them are immigrants? You know that this is not representative of the population being served by the average UK hospital. Besides, my daughter was born in Chertsey. So she is English. Her mother is also English but she speaks Dutch to her mothers, whose rest of the family is Dutch and this will allow her to maintain family connections in the future. At the same time, my daughter and I speak English. And I am ze German :P

You state that this level of immigration happened at “entirely unprecedented levels”. I don’t believe this is the case. England, and English, is the product of Roman, Viking, Norman, Saxon and French immigration. More recently, we all know of the Whitechapel Police requiring German, Polish, Russian and Yiddish interpreters while going from house to house to do their enquiries in the JtR murders. Meanwhile a friend of mine is presenting a gardening show on Phoenix FM radio in Essex. His name in Andrew Babicz. He is not Polish, he is born and bred in Scotland.

Migrant workforces are more flexible because they usually have no family with them. I mentioned the story of the polish guys here in Netherlands who were working their backsides off for an infrastructure project. I don’t care if they live in a shitty bedsit while they are here so they can increase their profit. I know I would have done the same. The problem is that the shitty bedsit exists in the first place, not the person renting it.

Cheers.

[Herlock Sholmes]

The "change and decline of this country" is not due to immigrants, it is due several decades of political short-sightedness and greed in general. Decades of cuts to councils and public services inevitably results in town centres (outside of London) turning into scenes from Apocalypse Z. Decades of housing mismanagement resulted in greedy landlords being allowed to charge £1000 for a mould-riddled bedsits. Or £2000 for a 3 bedroom council flat in a highrise somewhere. You say that “whole areas of our country which are no longer recognisable”. Unrecognisable from what? I see that whole areas of the country were basically a shabby shitehole of staggering grimness in the 1980’s and there were very few immigrants in sight. So I see no correlation between social problems and immigrants, I see a correlation between ideology-driven underfunding of public services and deregulation for the sake of capitalism. For example, deregulating building codes may result in more houses being built because the developer can make a bigger buck. Before I left the UK, I lived in a 2-bedroom development near Woking that was built around 1998. We had rising damp, single-glazing, a kitchen he size of a towel and the plaster around the front door coming off all the time. And no, I am not a slammer. I have just seen one like that (same development, exactly the same layout) on the market for more than half a million. Which is just insane.

Regarding the anecdotes above, they are just not backed up by stats. So you have an A&E waiting room where no one spoke English to each other? Is the suggestion that all of them are immigrants? You know that this is not representative of the population being served by the average UK hospital. Besides, my daughter was born in Chertsey. So she is English. Her mother is also English but she speaks Dutch to her mothers, whose rest of the family is Dutch and this will allow her to maintain family connections in the future. At the same time, my daughter and I speak English. And I am ze German :P

You state that this level of immigration happened at “entirely unprecedented levels”. I don’t believe this is the case. England, and English, is the product of Roman, Viking, Norman, Saxon and French immigration. More recently, we all know of the Whitechapel Police requiring German, Polish, Russian and Yiddish interpreters while going from house to house to do their enquiries in the JtR murders. Meanwhile a friend of mine is presenting a gardening show on Phoenix FM radio in Essex. His name in Andrew Babicz. He is not Polish, he is born and bred in Scotland.

Migrant workforces are more flexible because they usually have no family with them. I mentioned the story of the polish guys here in Netherlands who were working their backsides off for an infrastructure project. I don’t care if they live in a shitty bedsit while they are here so they can increase their profit. I know I would have done the same. The problem is that the shitty bedsit exists in the first place, not the person renting it.

Cheers.

No one would suggest that excessive immigration is the cause of every problem that exists in the country Svensson but a collective blind eye is being turned on an issue that means less to those living in nice trendy, upmarket areas but means a huge amount for people in working class areas and yet when those people tell government after government of they’re concerns they are simply ignored or dismissed as racists. Remember that old woman that confronted Gordon Brown about immigration and when he got back into his car he didn’t realise that his mic was still on and called her ‘bigoted.’ He later had to apologise. Remember when UKIP started taking votes from the main parties? Not one party leader had the backbone to accept that people from all walks of life were genuinely concerned about immigration…the politicians tried to pass it off as ‘protest voting’ on other issues because they are moral cowards.

Politicians are supposedly put into office by the people to try and achieve the kind of society that they want…not what the few want or what politicians themselves want. And if you ask people they will happily tell you of their concerns and immigration is a big issue for many people; I would say most people. For the last 13 years of YouGov polls, when people are asked about their concerns, between 40 and 50% have said immigration. An IPSOS poll this month, third highest issue - immigration. A Statista poll also has immigration at third biggest issue. Another current Statista poll asking what issues should politicians be discussing most between now and the election actually has immigration top. So however polls might vary it’s obvious that people are genuinely concerned and they are genuinely concerned for a reason and it’s not because they are all closet Klan members.

The anecdotes as you call them are ‘backed up’ because I know that they are true. And can you really question that whole areas of the country are no longer recognisable as being England? Really?

It saddens me even though I know that the cause is entirely lost. No one has the courage to do anything about it. I never thought that I’d hear myself say this because I’ve spent my life disliking Mrs Thatcher but….shes about the only one that I’d have had any hope of reversing the current trend. I’d previously hoped that a corner could be turned but that hope has died. England is dead. It’s now a third rate dumping ground run by people that hate it. If we were offered a look a 100 years into the future in England I genuinely don’t think that I would take up the offer. A country where English wasn’t the main language, where museums had been ransacked of anything in our history that wasn’t self-hating enough, a new national religion with the Church of England abolished, crime at ‘Escape From New York’ levels, the NHS a thing of the past.


If your house is full and you have no money you don’t invite people over to live in your spare room for free.

[Svensson]

Politicians are supposedly put into office by the people to try and achieve the kind of society that they want…not what the few want or what politicians themselves want. And if you ask people they will happily tell you of their concerns and immigration is a big issue for many people; I would say most people. For the last 13 years of YouGov polls, when people are asked about their concerns, between 40 and 50% have said immigration. An IPSOS poll this month, third highest issue - immigration. A Statista poll also has immigration at third biggest issue. Another current Statista poll asking what issues should politicians be discussing most between now and the election actually has immigration top. So however polls might vary it’s obvious that people are genuinely concerned and they are genuinely concerned for a reason and it’s not because they are all closet Klan members.

They are concerned about immigration becasue they are being told by politicians that they should be concerned about immigration. For example, on housing, the reason that consecutive governments have failed to produce sufficient numbers of genuinely and affordable housing is that they have left this all to the developers. They buy land, then they sit on it until it becomes profibale enough for them to build houses on it, and they build them at the highest possible margin. Meaning, "A complex of luxurious 1, 2 and 3-bedroom flats" at relatively low standards. They then sell them off and don't care that everything falls apart after 10 or 20 years. So these luxurious blocks of flats turn into dumpsters which attract dumpster-dwellers in the space of just a generation. And the reason this is all happening is because Tories have for decades absolved themselves of the responsibility to provide QUALITY to the population. They are ideologically inclined to take a sledgehammer to building regulations so that their mates and lobbyists at Taylor Wimpey, Willmots Dixon and Belway can make a big fat profit. They have had thier fingers in the till for decades and they are not about to change that. Instead, they tell everyone in the country that the immigrants are the real problem and they do this through their proganda pieces like Daily Mail, GB News, Daily Telegraph, etc. Btw, all of them are making staggering losses year on year, but their value to thier owners is not in the balance sheets but in thier twisted messaging they are pumping into the country's brains:

https://www.cityam.com/losses-balloon-to-44m-at-daily-mail-mail-on-sunday-and-the-i/

https://pressgazette.co.uk/news/andrew-neil-says-gb-news-can-never-be-profitable-on-current-path/

https://pressgazette.co.uk/news/telegraph-record-loss-financial-irregularities-operating-profit-increase/

So, are they going to close the till and cut off thier little gravy train? Or are they going to tell everyone that someone completely different is actually the root of all problems?

Answers on a postcard please.

And for the sake of this discussion, the reason I am so defensive on this is is that I am actually attacking the suggestion that by reducing the number of immigrants, we would reduce the number or severity of the problems in this country. Potholes don't fix themselves. Thames Water is not going to say "hey, all the immigrants are gone, we can now stop pumping raw sewage into the severn". You know this is not going to happen.

Cheers.

[Herlock Sholmes]

“They are concerned about immigration because they are being told by politicians that they should be concerned about immigration.”

I assume that you aren’t suggesting that people are incapable of forming an opinion that’s not simply one that that’s been fed them by other people? People are forming opinions and expressing concerns over what they see and experience every day where they live and work. They can’t avoid seeing and experiencing it. They have been expressing their concerns for years and have been completely ignored by all parties and they continue to be ignored.

For me it’s not just an issue of finance and I’d never suggest that immigration is the root cause of all issues but I find it difficult to believe for example that we wouldn’t feel at least some benefit from the absence of the 475,000 Romanian that have come here since 2011 to follow careers in begging and the formation of shoplifting gangs. Current estimates say that there are between 800,000 and 1,200,000 illegal immigrants in the UK. Then we have those that have come here legally in the last 2 or 3 years. Now if they weren’t here…..housing freed up, benefits not paid, NHS places not used up.

But as I said, it’s too late now as no one has the will to do anything. We surrendered the country years ago and if you express regret for the loss of your own country and its identity and history you get yells of ‘racist.’ How have we come to this tragic, warped state of affairs?