[Tubby Isaacs]

You’re correct to highlight the importance of housing provision in relation to immigration. But other services and infrastructure - schools, medical services, and so on - that come under pressure through demand in areas experiencing high volumes of immigrants (or, when we were EU members, nationals of other EU member states exercising treaty rights of free movement) are also important. I always argued that the failure to provide adequate investment in key services in such areas - to meet the increased demand arising from incoming migrant residents is and was a failure of government (which coincidentally provided Farage et al with the ammunition he needed to enable Brexit). It is to be hoped that Labour’s housebuilding programme will begin to address this issue.

On immigration and Labour generally, back in about 2013 when I was a full time Labour Organiser, I recall Ed Miliband telling us all that we had to talk about immigration, because if we didn’t, nobody would listen to what we had to say about anything else. This was when we were viciously excoriated by the Trots, Guardianistas, and others for marketing a policy slogan coffee mug with “Controls on Immigration” printed on it.

Things have changed slightly.

Yeah, the fuss over that sodding mug was pathetic. A "dog whistle" apparently, rather than something that virtually everybody apart from 10% of libertarians would have agreed with. Within 2 years, the left libertarians were happily cheering on a manifesto where we left the Single Market to avoid freedom of movement.

A higher, mobile population ought to be good for infrastructure, in that it would improve the business case for building new stuff. But I agree with you, that didn't happen, and that was a problem. And anyway, with the best will in the world, in lots of places the result will just be more cars, like where I live. Nobody's likely to open a light rail in Malvern or Hereford.

[satnav]

I am really struggling to think when there has been a serious debate on immigration on mainstream TV. Instead we have various news channels giving a running commentary on how many people have arrived on small boats with no attempt to provide any kind of context. If you are going to keep reporting on the number of people arriving in small boats you really should mention how many people have been deported each day or how many people have been granted asylum.

I'm sure I read somewhere that over 30 million people pass through Britain every year. Obviously the vast majority of these people are tourists or students who stay for a short period of time and then leave but do news channels ever report that 600,000 foreigners arrived in the country today?

Recently the Mirror did an article about a bloke and his elderly mother who ended up living in a Travel Lodge after being turfed out of their private rental property. The article was quite a grim read. Because they didn't have a kitchen they ended up living on pot noodles there was also little privacy and not a lot to do. I'm guessing that this is how many immigrants exist when they are housed in hotel yet I have not seen a single news report that actually looks at the reality of immigrants having to live for months i hotel rooms that are really only suitable for short term stays. No immigrant is enjoying 4 or 5 star service in hotels. They are merely surviving in totally unsuitable accommodation.

[Abernathy]

Indeed. These “hotels” housing asylum seekers in the main aren’t hotels at all. What these buildings are are former hotels, re-purposed as accommodation for asylum seekers, with most of the comfortable hotel amenities stripped out.

[Abernathy]

An important, and gratifyingly clear-thinking analytical Substack essay here from Paul Mason. I strongly urge you to read it, carefully.

https://htsf.substack.com/p/drowning-in ... irect=true

[Bones McCoy]

I'm struck by the absurdity of

"We don't know who is staying in those hotels".

I have no idea who is staying in the Premier Inn just up the road, or whether houses on the same street are running as Air BnBs.

[Tubby Isaacs]

An important, and gratifyingly clear-thinking analytical Substack essay here from Paul Mason. I strongly urge you to read it, carefully.

https://htsf.substack.com/p/drowning-in ... irect=true

That shit about Tower Hamlets from Rod Liddle. What's the evidence that many Bangladeshis "loathe" Britain? The kids do pretty well in exams for people who don't know anything about Britain, which you'd think would be quite the disadvantage.

[Killer Whale]

I'm struck by the absurdity of

"We don't know who is staying in those hotels".

I have no idea who is staying in the Premier Inn just up the road, or whether houses on the same street are running as Air BnBs.

The lunatic fringe of Welsh nationalism has long had an obsession with not knowing the detailed history of any English person moving into the Welsh countryside. A grooming gang (white, obvs) from the English midlands was discovered in Pembrokeshire some years ago. That was enough to 'prove' that their suspicions about 'the English' were justified. Keep them out, or at least make them submit detailed medical and criminal justice papers.

[Tubby Isaacs]

That's quite spectacular, seeing England and Wales have the same criminal justice system. Do they think Dyfed-Powys Police has the life story of everybody in Gwent?

[Abernathy]

This, from a lady called Zoe Dargue, found on the Fleecebook. THIS. FUCKING THIS.

Listen, I don’t want this country to fall apart either. I don’t want violence on the streets. I don’t want young girls being groomed. I don’t want services wrecked or stretched so thin they barely work. Of course, I want justice for people who’ve been harmed, and of course, I want to live in a society I can actually be proud of.

But I can’t be proud of this. I can’t even stomach it.
All these flags being hung up like trophies, these “rallies,” this constant drumbeat of rage — it’s not patriotism, it’s NATIONALISM. It’s theatre. It’s a trick that too many people keep falling for.

You’ve been wound up, poked, and pushed into this by algorithms, clickbait, and grifters who thrive on chaos. Nigel Farage and Tommy Robinson don’t actually give a damn about you or your family. They’re not leaders – they’re performers like Taylor Swift, Beyonce, or Trump. They’re salesmen. They cash in every time you get angry, every time you march, every time you hang up a flag thinking you’re “protecting Britain.” You’re not. You’re just advertising their brand.

And let’s be honest, we’ve seen these tactics before. Pick a group, paint them as a danger, hang flags in the name of “protecting the homeland,” then claim it’s just patriotism. Same chants, same enemies, different decade. Other countries have gone down this road before and every time it ends in blood, shame, and people saying afterwards: How did we let this happen?

Tommy Robinson isn’t “saying what no one else dares to say.” He’s a violent opportunist who depends on your rage to stay on the payroll. And Farage? Same game in a smarter suit. Neither of them want solutions — solutions would kill their careers. They’re not here to save Britain. They’re here to milk it. They keep repeating the same old lines — “they’re stealing your jobs,” “they’re threatening your daughters,” “they’re ruining your country” — always focused on a scapegoat, never on a real problem. It’s the same rotten playbook, dusted off and handed to you like it’s something new. Except this time, it’s even more pathetic because we already know how that chapter of history ends.
And here’s the thing no one wants to admit: once the “migrants” are gone, it won’t be done. You’ll just be handed the name of the next “enemy.” That’s how this script always plays out. If it’s not them, it’s Trans people. If not them, it’s women. The list never runs out. It’s not about saving the country. It’s about keeping you scared and angry enough to keep marching in circles while they profit.

So let’s call this for what it is. Britain isn’t being destroyed by migrants or minorities. It’s being destroyed by people too stubborn to see they are marching to somebody else’s drum. A drum whose beat we heard in 1933.

And that’s the part people keep dodging — this isn’t just some new, angry moment in British politics. It’s recycled. It’s borrowed straight from the same handbook used nearly a century ago, created by men I was told to always stand against. We all know how that story ends. Flags in the windows, marches in the streets, neighbours turning on neighbours. Entire races of people deemed subhuman.

And if we don’t wake up? We’re lining ourselves up to play the exact same roles all over again. History does repeat itself. And right now, we're just before he invaded Poland.

THINK FOR YOUR FUCKING SELF.

[Malcolm Armsteen]

I'm stealing that (attributed, of course).

[Bones McCoy]

Zoe's piece is extremely good.

Such a shame it will fly over the heads of most of its intended audience.

[Boiler]

Whilst listening to R4 in the car just now, I heard Evan Davies reference an at-length interview with one of the Bell Hotel asylum seekers: has anyone else heard it?

Apparently it was on PM this week. https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cdxy0p9jx1qo

[Abernathy]

Well, like, I’d imagine, a few other Mailwatchers, I’m uneasy about the “Danish style” changes to asylum & immigration law announced today by Shabana Mahmood.

But harking back to the start of this thread, it would appear that the issue of asylum & immigration is still high on the priority list of important issues that the government must address. Bizarrely, when the same voters are asked how the various priority issues actually affect them, the issue drops down to seventh place in the “most important” list.

I think that that gap represents the space where Farage, Yaxley-Lennon & co are muscling into . Hatred, racism, and xenophobia are being fomented, highlighted, and mobilised to push Reform UK plc up the opinion poll ratings.

It’ll be interesting to see whether the Danish style legislative changes (which are likely to be passed with Tory support even if there is a backbench Labour rebellion - an awful look politically) change the dial at all on public opinion on asylum & immigration. I rather suspect that it will not.

But on the issue itself : it is never really going to go away. Population movements globally via migration are only increasing due to wars, famine, disease, and climate change in multiple regions, and will keep doing so. The UK, whether we like it or not, is viewed as a safe place for many to seek refuge in for many reasons - such as, for example, the globally spoken English language. That is both something to be proud of, and a problematic issue for UK society and in particular, UK politics. To misquote V.I. Lenin, something must be done. The consequences 3 or 4 years hence if we get it wrong could well be a Reform UK led government, and Prime Minister Farage. Bog only knows where we go from there.

[satnav]

I think the problem that the Labour government has got is that they have be faced with a fairly hostile media from day one. Sky News and GB News are constantly going on about immigration and providing Farage with a platform where he can churn out lies and misinformation without being challenged.

The media narrative has been that immigration has really got out of control under Labour and that Labour has been slow to react because they don't want to be seen as racist. Given this narrative Labour had no choice but to issue tough policies that are on a par with Reform and the Tories.

If Labour can neutralise the immigration issue they probably think that the media might eventually move on to other policy areas where Labour is actually making some progress.

[Tubby Isaacs]

The particularly difficult thing has been that the boat people come from France. It's very hard to get lots of the public to accept that they were fleeing persecution there. Obviously we know that they can claim asylum anywhere, but to lots of people that looks like it's less a bunch of terrified people who've got out by the skin of their teeth, as a bunch of people who've probably paid a lot of money to come to Britain for economic reasons. It's not surprising they don't see this as being Kindertransport.

I don't really know what you do about this. Tell them they're wrong? We tried that with Brexit, and the results were from 2015 onwards went against it.

[Rosvanian]

Lest we forget, huh.

[kreuzberger]

My barber walked here. He came here from Damascus. He comes from a, by any measure, normal, middle class family, and they had enough cash for him, Nadal, to form a bridgehead for his wife and kids. He walked for 80 days and nights to get here. He's a muzzie and stays off the beer to keep his weight in check

The money spent had been ear-marked for the kids' education, but that had to be gambled on fleeing an increasingly dangerous and intolerable situation in Syria. His business is hardly Nvidia but he keeps his head above water.

As a racist, you have to work hard at being a bigot if you are not to hold people like this in awe. Rather than spin these myriad positives, Mahmood had chosen to capitulate.

[Boiler]

I really hope that we haven't just witnessed a case of "If you can't beat 'em, join 'em".

Spotted on the BBC website:

MP for Blackley and Middleton South, Graham Stringer, said the home secretary was "going down the right track".

He said she would reach a "compromise" with Labour MPs but added: "It might all be for naught if we don't get out of the European Convention on Human Rights."

What?

[Tubby Isaacs]

Asylum seekers working more is something I'm surprised doesn't get more of a run out, which can be represented both in terms of reducing costs and being tough, if you want (as well as positive things as well). I don't know if it's been agreed with Macron not to do it because it would make the UK more attractive. But it might be better than the Macron deal anyway, unless the numbers of boat people start coming down.