The Tribune

By PETER YOUNG

As Britain gears up for a General Election less than five months away, the thorny subject of immigration has taken centre stage again with prime minister David Cameron announcing new measures to deter the rising numbers of people seeking to settle there.

Britain is not alone in debating this contentious issue. President Obama’s recent executive action – providing protection against deportation for some five million undocumented immigrants together with action to stop the flow of illegal arrivals – has attracted major controversy. Likewise, there has been criticism here in the Bahamas of action to enforce a new immigration policy, including a round-up of illegal immigrants.

In both cases, the basic choice seems to be either deportation or regulation of the status of those already living in the respective countries and then stopping illegal newcomers from crossing borders.

The issue in Britain is more complicated because those arriving from the other 27 European Union (EU) member states have to be handled differently from those coming from non-EU countries.

The Treaty of Rome in 1957 provided for the right of free movement of workers within the then European Economic Community. This founding treaty was signed by Belgium, France, Italy, Luxembourg, the Netherlands and the then West Germany. At that time, agreement to free movement among these developed countries of Western Europe must have appeared as reasonable and, indeed, necessary for the organisation to develop progressively from a trading bloc and customs union into a full-blown political union as envisaged by the founding fathers.

In 1992, the Maastricht Treaty created the EU and the single European currency – the euro – and also led to the creation of the EU single market which ensured the free movement of goods, capital services and people, including the right to look for work in other EU states.

Recently, EU leaders, including German Chancellor Angela Merkel and the new Commission President, Jean-Claude Juncker, have made it clear that Britain must continue to accept EU rules about immigration so that the fundamental right of free movement of workers is non-negotiable. This means that, while Britain is able to limit non-EU immigration in accordance with its own well established system of rules, it is unable – short of leaving the EU or renegotiating the Treaty of Rome – to control the influx of people from the rest of the Union.

Critics of the current Tory/Liberal Democrat coalition government say that Mr Cameron must have been aware of this constraint when, in the face of rising numbers of people within the EU seeking to enter Britain, he unwisely pledged in 2011 to keep net migration in the tens of thousands rather than the hundreds of thousands – as he said at the time, this was his aim and “no ifs, no buts”.

The official figures paint a different and startling picture.

According to the Office of National Statistics, in the year to June 2014 the numbers arriving to live in the UK hit 583,000 with 323,000 leaving. Thus, far from being reduced, net migration has surged to 260,000. Some two thirds of the increase of arrivals came from the EU and the number of EU immigrants registering for work has grown by 55 per cent since the last General Election in 2010.

The arrival of large numbers of low-skilled, poorer people from Bulgaria and Romania, too many of whom have ended up begging on the streets of London, has hit the headlines, but the figures also include others from countries like Italy, Spain and Portugal. Overall, some two million immigrants entered the United Kingdom during the Labour government’s period of office from 1997-2010 and the population has now increased by 4.6 million.

Clearly, the higher numbers from across Europe are attributable to the UK’s stronger economy compared to those in the eurozone and to overly generous welfare benefits so that it is seen as a desirable location – or, as some term it, an El Dorado which is attracting so-called welfare tourists.

It is now generally accepted in Britain that the pressure on public services, housing, schools, the welfare system and the National Health Service of this sort of uncontrolled EU immigration in a relatively small and overcrowded island is becoming intolerable.

In particular, EU migrants are swamping specific parts of Britain – for example, Peterborough, Slough and Ealing near London and Boston in Lincolnshire – though, hitherto, use of the term “swamping” in this context has been considered as provocative and unnecessarily alarmist. But, as a leading Labour member of parliament, Frank Field, described it recently, the nation’s population is increasing by the size of its second city of Birmingham every two-and-a-half years and there are no proper contingency plans to provide more infrastructure in order to prevent potential chaos.

Where, formerly, critics of uncontrolled immigration were accused of xenophobia and being “Little Englanders”, the subject is no longer taboo. Even the Archbishop of Canterbury, the leader of the Church of England, has voiced concern about the need to handle immigration issues carefully in a country which has become “very, very crowded”.

The Labour opposition has changed its tune and is now arguing for “fair immigration” – a reversal of policy after the Blair government had changed the face of the country by earlier opening the floodgates in the supposed interest of multiculturalism, globalisation and European integration and with the expectation that immigrants were more likely than not to vote Labour.

Taking a step back from the current debate, it is interesting to reflect on Britain’s history as a nation of mixed peoples – Picts, Celts, Norsemen, Angles and Saxons, Normans, Jews, Huguenots, Poles and Ukrainians (displaced after the Second World War) and, of course, the citizens of Commonwealth countries following the dismantlement of empire.

It also has a history, stretching back hundreds of years, of providing a haven for those fleeing from religious and political persecution – a place of asylum, safety, rescue and hope. A proud tradition of democracy, tolerance, free speech and the rule of law with an independent judiciary has been a magnet for those seeking relief.

Nonetheless, the public reaction to mass immigration over the years has been mixed. The arrival by ship of 500 settlers from Jamaica on the Empire Windrush in 1948 (the initial wave of Commonwealth immigrants to meet labour shortages at the end of the Second World War) was not universally welcomed, nor was the influx in 1973 of thousands of Asians expelled from Uganda by its notorious leader, Idi Amin.

In 1962, a Conservative government led by prime minister Harold Macmillan imposed curbs on immigration from the non-white Commonwealth. At the time, fears of being engulfed by settlers from the Commonwealth mirrored those now being expressed about EU migration. The then home secretary, R A Butler, is quoted as saying that “a sizeable part of the entire population of the earth is at present legally entitled to come and stay in this already densely populated country” – and, infamously, there was the “rivers of blood” speech by leading Tory Enoch Powell in reaction to the government’s decision in 1968 to admit 50,000 dependents of existing Commonwealth immigrants admitted prior to the 1962 restrictions. He condemned this development as “mad, literally mad”, predicting that it would lead to fighting and bloodshed on Britain’s streets.

Despite all this, there is little doubt that immigration over a long period has brought with it cultural and economic benefits to Britain. The issue now is not whether there should be more immigration but rather how to control its quality and quantity.

In response to the current controversy, Mr Cameron has stated that Britain must be able to control its immigration while upholding the idea of free movement within the EU.

His strategy is to reduce the financial incentive to move to Britain in order to deter those who are unable or unwilling to work and to contribute to society. Thus, while backing off from an outright cap, quota or emergency brake, which would breach fundamental EU rules, he has proposed various measures designed to make Britain a less attractive destination for would-be EU settlers – a four-year qualifying period before immigrants are eligible to receive “in-work” benefits, the scrapping of child benefits for children living outside Britain and the deportation of migrants who have not found work in Britain within six months.

The Prime Minister has also indicated that EU immigrants may be required to have a job before moving to the UK and it is not yet clear whether all these and other more detailed proposals for tightening up welfare benefits will require some form of EU treaty change. But he has pledged that immigration will be a core element of his forthcoming renegotiation of the terms of Britain’s membership of the EU. He has also promised that, if this renegotiation is unsuccessful, there will be an in/out referendum in 2017 provided he is re-elected.

In the conditions of today’s globalisation, with vast numbers of people on the move both for employment and as tourists, it is hard to argue against a sovereign nation’s right to control its borders. However, the logic of the EU’s aim of political union and a federal superstate is that free movement amongst its 28 member countries is a vehicle for destroying the traditional nation state and promoting a new concept of EU citizenship.

Against this backdrop, Mr Cameron will surely have his work cut out in trying to curb EU migration. But his attempt to reduce welfare benefits for these immigrants is surely a first step in the right direction.

• Peter Young is a retired British diplomat living in Nassau. From 1996 to 2000 he was British High Commissioner to the Bahamas.