Bring Your Huddled Masses

In theory, I’m generally fairly relaxed about immigration, as long as the system is designed for the benefit of the recipient country (ie no terrorists, pimps and gangsters, but instead skilled people who want to work). I must say I was a little shocked by these numbers though:

It brought the total number of workers from the accession countries to almost 300,000, which is 20 times the original estimate given by the Government.

That’s in just 18 months, so 500 people a day have been arriving from Eastern Europe. The problem of open borders is not the numbers (Though 300.000 people looking for accommodation must have had an impact on the housing market), but rather the idea of the right to stay. It’s rather as if you hosted a party, where you had no right to choose who was going to come. Most of the guests are delightful, but the ones that cause trouble, you knew would be trouble all along, yet you were not allowed to stop them coming in. Sovereignty means nothing, if you do not control the keys to the door.