| Topic: | Re:Re:Re:Re:Re:Re:Re:Re:Re:Re:IMF | |
| Posted by: | Robert Fish | |
| Date/Time: | 27/08/25 20:19:00 |
| I really don't think that the Brexit vote spoke to people's fears about immigration. The real discontent was the economy, the neglect of the regions and the impoverishment of the less well-off in society, mostly those far from court. The dishonest and disastrous austerity programme created the conditions which the ghastly little xenophobe, Farage, exploited for his own nefarious ends. In his project to blame "the other" for the problems of the UK he was stoutly supported by the Tory tabloids. Cameron was an idiot not to realise how the vote would go. He obviously never went into a newsagents or a supermarket, and read the headlines. Almost every day in the run-up to the referendum The Mail and the Express carried stories, many completely false, about yet another EU outrage. And here we are today: austerity has nominally been dropped, but it still lingers on - in Rachel Reeves's reluctance to abandon Tory fiscal rules, lest she leave the Labour government open to the usual lazy charges of spendthrift irresponsibility. Nor does she have the courage to borrow her way out of the hole dug over 14 years, lest she alarm the bond market. Thus we remain in the same old bind - increased taxation or public service cuts? The discontent which drove Brexit continues, and provides Farage with an ever more solid platform for his odious views. And Starmer doesn't have the courage to stand up to him, and call him out. Instead, he tries to counter the drift to Farage by copying him. The May White Paper on Immigration proposed, inter alia: ending the exemption for social workers; reducing the length of the graduate visa for international students to stay on and work in the UK from 2 years to 18 months; requiring the partners of people moving to the UK on work visas to have basic English to qualify for a dependant visa; and increasing the qualifying period for settlement from 5 to 10 years. And don't forget Starmer's "island of strangers" comment. In all that he says, and his government proposes, Starmer gives credibility to Farage. After she's lived here for almost 42 years, my wife has applied for UK citizenship, because we don't like the direction of this country, with Farage allowed to set the agenda. Grow some, Keir! |