It's Always Nice When People Think Well of Your Country

[Sukerkin]

This article on the BBC web-site gave me pause for thought and made me a little ashamed of some of the stronger anti-immigration comments I have made over the past year or so :

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-11533269

I still think I am right when I say that we need to get some functional regulation on the ebbs and flows of population before we lose that which makes Britain 'British' but the people in this article seem to hold much the same views too!

 

[First Action]

Im an Australian currently in the UK and your immigration laws, in comparison to ours, are very lax. It seems England just lets everyone in. However, my parents (as many Australians) are not from Australia originally but I don't feel it makes me any less Australian, in fact I'm often more patriotic than most European Aussies. Im sure the same feelings are in british immigrants also.

 

[MA-Caver]

Well lookit this way... the world is getting smaller all the time. People are going to move into your neighborhood/town/city/country whether you want them to or not, no matter where they're from.

Out in my neck of the woods, we've got a lot of Indians moving in and setting up shops where as those immigrants were an extreme rarity a number of years ago. Also hispanics are making themselves known. Should we be surprised? Of course not. Being a melting pot type of country it shouldn't be any surprise.
Far as Britain goes... well it used to be that the reigning Monarchy had a say so in who stays and who goes. Non (white) brits were usually kept as servants to the upper crusts and everyone else... well they could visit but be damned if they could reside. Now it's not like that... isn't it.

As Bob Dylan once sang... "times, they are a changing".

 

[Sukerkin]

Historically, in recent centuries, the number of non-indigenous members of the population was relatively low, not because of any deliberate policy but because it was both difficult to get here and there was no reason to come here as, for the non-aristocratic, life was probably worse here than in many other parts of the world (with rubbish weather to add to the misery before the early grave received you).

Immigration started in earnest after WWII, when additional labour was needed to rebuild our battered country. Primarily that was West Indian in the first instance. That coincided with an outpouring of 'Empire Guilt' for the Asian parts of what came to be the Commonwealth and granting of citizenship, for those that wanted it, by way of an apology for past misdeeds and a thank-you for aid in times of war. Then came the EU ...

 

[drwhitefield]

As Bob Dylan once sang... "times, they are a changing".

Funny how that was sung 4 decades ago!

 

[Tez3]

We have a good many Commonwealth soldiers in the forces, many are being injured and killed for this country. They have no right of abode here when they leave the Forces, they have to go home but they still serve this country with pride and great sacrifice. They don't do it for the money, the pay isn't that good.