Of course, it’s all very expensive for the Tories – but when you have the bosses of the big global corporations who do well out of the EU trough and cheap labour via uncontrolled immigration in your pocket then why worry? OK your party membership at local level is collapsing but, like the banks, who needs branches when you can centralise?
women, especially those with young families. Such women, alongside Ukip supporters who used to vote Tory, were a key audience for the reshuffle, both precisely identified by that polling operation for a data-driven reshuffle that is without precedent in British politics.
Odd, though, that “UKIP supporters” should be furrowing brows amidst all those data drivers at Tory HQ…..UKIP, a party led by political outsiders, permanently cash strapped with only the bare bones of a professional cadre and with no support from any national media outlet yet which consistently polls well ahead of the Liberal Democrats. Enough, if it continues, to possibly win a seat or two, certainly enough to undermine the chances of the Tories getting a working majority in 2015.
There is little evidence yet of a fall in Ukip support now the European Parliament elections have passed, confounding the expectations of pundits who believed the European election victory was the “peak Ukip moment”. Our estimates have Farage’s party at 14.8 per cent, down just 0.1 per cent on last month. The Liberal Democrats, however, continue to slide to new record lows. This month they register just 8.8 per cent, down 0.5 per cent on last month, and an all-time low under our new methodology.
Much ink has been spilt, of course, over a lack of clarity over UKIP’s policies on tax, the NHS etc and, to be fair, some of this criticism has been justified. But then to what extent can people be clear about the policies of the three establishment parties on these issues. However most voters are aware that UKIP wants to withdraw from the EU (not negotiate) and impose stricter controls on immigration – and they say you cannot have one without the other. The three establishment parties claim to be concerned about uncontrolled immigration but don’t really want to leave the EU. They also have hang ups about upsetting the high priests of political correctness in the media. UKIP couldn’t care less about the media, focus groups or pontificating pundits – what you see is what you get and that message has resonated, pitching through all the spin and PR noise of modern politics.
James Brokenshire, the new Conservative immigration minister, accused better-off families and big businesses of benefiting from the recent arrival of foreign workers in Britain. By contrast, “ordinary, hard-working people” have not felt the economic benefits of immigration, the minister said.
Much of the grumbling from the metropolitan elite and sharp elbowed business types about Brokenshire is evidence that the accusation hit home. But quote of the week must come from Tory Stewart Jackson, MP for Peterborough, a town straining to cope with an influx of 25,000 immigrants over the last ten years.
Just think, without Farage and UKIP gaining traction over the last two years, this public conversation just would not be happening….
PS….notice how Labour is keeping very quiet….I wonder why?
Comments Off on Famous & Respectable Media Pundit Repeats UKIP Line On Immigration…”Forgets” To Mention UKIP…I Wonder Why?
Famous & Respectable Media Pundit Repeats UKIP Line On Immigration…”Forgets” To Mention UKIP…I Wonder Why?
Regular Daily Telegraph pundit Peter Oborne pens a worrrying piece about the impact on the social fabric of Britain after January 1st when Romanians and Bulgarians, as citizens of the EU, will have unrestricted access to the UK.
The new migrants will be hungry for jobs, and are bound to price some British workers out of the market. They will have the right to use our schools and NHS, which are already creaking. They will need housing, and welfare benefits.
But there is a cost to the social fabric, and it is always the poor and powerless who pay the highest price.
Oborne talks about how Cameron, Miliband and other leading politicians need to have the courage to stand up to the EU and develop a strategy to make access far more difficult.
The moral case for such drastic action is very strong. Despite tentative signs of recovery, Britain still faces an economic emergency. Nearly one million young people, almost 20 per cent of the labour force under 25, are out of work. Some of their jobs would surely go to the new Eastern European migrants. Mr Cameron should argue that this is a situation no civilised government can tolerate.
“What’s that noise?” I hear you say.
Only Greer called the X word out to Diane James. Soubry used the S word to Nigel Farage. Both did it on BBC Question Time. But not to a highly “respected” media pundit like Oborne but to James and Farage because they belonged to UKIP.
Oddly enough Oborne doesn’t mention UKIP at all in his piece (quelle surprise) which is strange because there is nothing original in his article….UKIP has been saying exactly the same for several years.
UKIP HAS BEEN SAYING EXACTLY THE SAME FOR SEVERAL YEARS…..
Oh dear Peter….you’d rather choke than say that wouldn’t you!!!
Tim Wigmore is one of those bright young chaps at the Telegraph who have been tasked with bringing errant Tory voters back into the Cameron fold and away from UKIP. One prong of the strategy is the Vote UKIP get Miliband mantra being pimped by Toby Young’s Unite The Right crusade. The key message of UTR is for UKIP to stand down in key marginals and not rock the boat in safer Conservative constituencies. The result? Cameron stays at No !0 and can then renege on another “cast iron guarantee” after producing some sort of fudged, face saving “agreement “ full of vague rhetoric and short on hard detail.
As you may have read today, migrants are more likely to pay taxes and less likely to take benefits than Brits.
There you are, says Tim. These are “facts” fresh from the “experts” so quit all this nonsense about immigrants being a burden on the state – it’s the Brits who are sucking at the teat.
But hang on a minute Tim. From whence do those figures come? Could they be, as Douglas Carswell suggests, a tad questionable?
The “experts” who make such claims have failed to look at all the evidence. Those who insist that migrants are less likely to claim benefits tend to draw their data from the Labour Force Survey, which relies on respondents reporting claims to benefits, rather than actual data on claims made.
There are nearly half a million migrants claiming working tax credit in the UK.
Migrants are at least 20% more likely to be claiming working tax credit than the rest of the population.
More migrants claim working tax credit than claim all of the main out-of-work benefits together.
So maybe those UKIP “scare stories” are not just stories, Tim….just saying..
In fact it’s Tim who spreads the scare story.
A ban on immigration would mean higher taxes, lower spending and a higher deficit.
Now that is over egging the pudding, Tim. UKIP has never said ban all immigration. We just believe in Controlled Immigration where the main drivers are the skills sets required by the economy and the ability of our social infrastructure – housing stock, schools, healthcare etc – to absorb those numbers efficiently and effectively.
The country’s top GP yesterday rejected a Government crackdown on health tourism as ‘xenophobic’.
Dr Clare Gerada, of the Royal College of General Practitioners, insisted doctors would not act as ‘a new border agency’ by asking about the immigration status of patients.
And she cast doubt on the findings of a Government report warning of the huge cost of foreign visitors and short-term migrants.
Of course, I mean since they gave up after hours care our GPs have so little time in which they can spend their six figure taxpayer funded salary.
Once again the medical trade unions pose as monks and nuns, serving the people with no thought of enriching themselves – it really beggars belief that they still feel they can pretend they have no wish to be soiled by the mere mention of money.
However it must be made clear to Dr Gerada that it is not for her to refuse the instructions of an employer to administer/collect such charges. Fortunately it appears that she does not speak for a majority of her colleagues.
Always beware of politicians who call for a “debate” about an issue. What they really mean is a series of carefully orchestrated statements from key figures within the Westminster bubble. The one thing they do not want to hear about is anything from the great unwashed who live outside that bubble.
Labour’s Yvette Cooper surely had a point today when she said that politicians of all sorts should be more candid about how much – and how little – they can really do on immigration.
You see there is absolutely nothing that any British government can do about immigrants from within the EU because we have unilaterally surrendered control of our own borders to Brussels.
There is also nothing we can do about immigrants who arrive here either legally or illegally from outside the EU because we have unilaterally acknowledged the European Court of Human Rights as superior to British courts of law.
…..and they would never ever advocate that, would they?
Comments Off on Oh Dear…The BBC Has Been In Denial About Immigration Concerns For Many Years…Never Mind, Water Under The Bridge…..
Oh Dear…The BBC Has Been In Denial About Immigration Concerns For Many Years…Never Mind, Water Under The Bridge…..
The report found that the BBC was too reliant on the views of politicians, who tended to steer clear of “taboo” subjects, such as immigration, and warned that “even today the debate on the BBC may not reflect the public mood”…………………….
……………………………….His report concluded: “The BBC was slow to reflect the weight of concern in the wider community about issues arising from immigration. “It remains the case that the agenda of debate is probably too driven by the views of politicians.
“Slow to reflect” is far too gentle a phrase. For nearly fifty years, from Enoch Powell onwards, the BBC has either demonised or ignored any individual or group raising concerns about the sheer scale of immigration into the UK – not just in the news or documentaries but in drama, “comedy” or soaps.
The full impact of mass immigration on British life was laid bare last night by a Home Office report.
It said that half the population lives in a town or city which has experienced high levels of immigration over the past decade.
Don’t expect any change from the BBC, however. Oh they’ll prattle on about “lessons learned” and “balance” but the culture is too deeply embedded for any significant change in attitude, not just at the BBC but throughout our media and political elite where “diversity” is something to be celebrated – as long as it is far away from their own leafy streets and their children’s schools.
Yet another pratfall for former PR man David Cameron as the massively hyped roadblock to immigration turns out to be a two inch high barrier of tissue paper.
A major crackdown by David Cameron on immigration was unravelling rapidly today after it emerged that it would only affect a small minority of foreigners in Britain.
Is anyone surprised? Scared stiff by the spectre of the rising popularity of UKIP his team of whizz kid advisers take a break from their school homework and x boxing and tell him to go ukip lite. The UKIP supporters are as thick as planks, they tell him, so just mention a couple of keywords (immigration and, before that, referendum) and they’ll all come flocking back.
So he puts on his serious “watching like a hawk” face and expects us to buy into his rhetoric.
He knows and we know that any serious attempt to block EU immigration would be broken immediately by our E£CHR loving judges in partnership with hand wringing sob stories from the BBC/Guardianistas spearheaded by St Joan Bakewell. Cameron and his inner clique are from the Notting Hill end of the media/political elite. They despise ordinary people as mindless drones swayed only by Paul Dacre and the Murdoch press. Keep them quiet with a few buzzwords then get them back to their TV screens..
It won’t work this time, Mr C. You use the EU and the Lib Dems and Hacked Off as fall guys for your own core belief and that’s the same driving force that got you your achievement-free stint as a second rate PR man for Carlton TV.
Your core belief is simply the advance of David Cameron – and nothing else.
Times are changing, Mr C. We’ve woken up to your con game.
We just don’t believe anything you say any more..