I’m always tickled when I see comments like Tweet #7 above from ‘Freethinking Economist’:

“Liberal Conspiracy or Unity have a quite brilliant post about immigration. I have not read it at all, but …” since it seems to confirms what I already believe there’s really no need to, is there? LOL.

More to follow.

Shorter Dan Dare: “First”

Hey Unity!

Any chance you could cite your sources for the data here?

The statements from Balanced Migration that you characterise as ‘rubbish’ appear to derive from the ONS under a FoI request. How did you come by the same data?

We need to understand where you’re pulling your figures from.

“New figures published today show just how few new jobs in Britain have gone to British born workers.”

Why the surprise when this is the main reason?

“Up to 12 million working UK adults have the literacy skills expected of a primary school child, the Public Accounts Committee says. . . The report says there are up 12 million people holding down jobs with literacy skills and up to 16 million with numeracy skills at the level expected of children leaving primary school.”
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/education/4642396.stm

“A £2bn scheme to improve basic skills among adults has been called a ‘depressing failure’ by education inspectors.”
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/education/4506410.stm

“An estimated 5.2 million adults have worse literacy than that expected of 11 year olds, while 14.9 million have numeracy skills below this level.”
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/education/4095153.stm

And don’t blame it all on Gordon Brown.

In the mid 1970s, half the adult population in Britain had no education qualifications at all. By the mid 1990s, that had declined to a quarter. But even now, 20,000+ are leaving school a year with no qualifications and less than half school leavers achieve the benchmark of 5 GCSE subjects at A*-C grades, including maths and English.

It really isn’t amazing if so many jobs have gone to better educated migrants – mainly from other EU countries.

All the data in this comes from the ONS.

As noted in the article, the major flaw in Balanced Migration’s press release is that they treat the data for net increases in employment as if it were data for job creation i.e. new jobs.

This is incorrect. New jobs are being created all the time, even during a recession, it just that during a recession more existing jobs are typically lost than new one are created and net employment falls.

There are other problems which stem from treating the data as if is showed a single linear trend, rather than one consisting of two distinct phases, 97-03 and 04-08, and from the inclusion of data from Q2 2008 to Q1 2009 without the essential qualification that this data relates to the current recession and, therefore, marks a break in the previous trend which needs to be treated rather differently.

t really isn’t amazing if so many jobs have gone to better educated migrants – mainly from other EU countries.

Its not necessarily EU countries making up the shortfall, even if by far the largest number of work permits issued to A8 migrants were for jobs in administration, business and management.

The evidence for 2004-2008 shows employers pulling on most of the available ‘pool’ of skilled migrants, with 24% of the net increase coming from people born in the Middle East, North Africa and Asia.

It’s too easily forgotten that many of the asylum seekers who arrived here in the early part of the decade having been displaced by the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan were from amongst the more educated segments of those populations. If you’re going to escape from those countries and travel all the way to the UK it helps considerable if you have the financial resources to make the trip, and it usually only the middle classes who have access to that kind of money.

It’s only further down the line that you start to get asylum seekers and other migrants from lower down the socio-economic scale entering the UK via organised, and unlawful, indentured labour trafficking.

Its worth noting that the only migrant group to show a net fall in employment between 2004 and 2008 were Bangladeshis, a group in which much of the migration to the UK has traditionally come from rural communities in the Sylhet division. They’ve been hit badly by the new points system, hence there were headlines a while ago about an impending labour shortage in the curry house sector.

*Applauds*

Although I’ve only skim read the text and looked at the pretty pictures, so I won’t actually be joining in the debate proper until I see a counterpoint to rebuff.

My wife is a British citizen, and moved from South Africa when she was 10. Interesting to see that she’d still be lumped along with the flood of “IMMIGRANTS”. I mean, it obviously makes sense when you think about it, I’d just never made that conceptual leap.

I do not need all this, all I need do is look around my town to see how immigration has changed this country, I hardly ever see Asians working in Tesco or Asda, I hardly see any working in factories, yet I see lots of them around, we now have little China Town, and Little Pakistan, OK they leave me along and I leave them alone. I live on a 230 house estate council of course, and not one single person is Asian.

Am I happy about it, I do not much care really people come and go, so long as nobody asks me to change I’m happy

@8: “I hardly ever see Asians working in Tesco or Asda”

You obviously don’t visit the Tescos, Asdas or the Morrisons in and around a London borough where I live.

According to this clip from a BBC Newsnight report about London, 40 per cent of London residents were born abroad:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/7368326.stm

In the public debates about migration and asylum seekers, it is seldom mentioned that according to the 2001 census nearly half of all ethnic minorities living in Britain live in London:

“In 2001 minority ethnic groups were more likely to live in England than in the other countries of the UK. In England, they made up 9 per cent of the total population compared with only 2 per cent in both Scotland and Wales and less than 1 per cent in Northern Ireland. The minority ethnic populations were concentrated in the large urban centres. Nearly half (45 per cent) of the total minority ethnic population lived in the London region, where they comprised 29 per cent of all residents.”
http://www.statistics.gov.uk/cci/nugget.asp?id=263

But then:

“London is a major net contributor to the Exchequer: Our estimates suggest that London continues to be a substantial net contributor to UK public finances, by between £6 and £18 billion in 2003-04, despite the deterioration in public finances at a national level, with the mid-point of the range of estimates implying a net contribution of £12.1 billion.”
Oxford Economic Forecasting: London’s Place in the UK Economy 2005-6
http://www.cityoflondon.gov.uk/NR/rdonlyres/FDE5A744-1E6B-4C0E-9569-EAE36325737B/0/BC_RS_LKPUK0607_ExecSumm.pdf

Resident taxpayers in London and the South East region have been subsidising public spending in the rest of Britain.

When the Scots vote on going independent, I think we should have a vote in London too.

@DHP [7]

Well I for one wouldn’t consider your wife to be an immigrant assuming, that is, she is of British stock. In that case she’d be returning kith-and-kin.

Before launching into an alternative view on the numbers, which is rather challenging anyway given Unity’s coyness about about his souces, I wanted to express my astonishment at the attitudes expressed in the original article. I haven’t heard terms like ‘scraping the top of the underclass’ since attending Young Consersative meetings in the 1960s. To depict one’s fellow countrymen, especially members of the working class, in such terms hardly reflects traditional liberal sensibilities I would have thought. These days even Labour ministers are more circumspect than that in disguising their contempt for the WWC.

As for functional literacy, as defined by the ability to interpret a Calpol label, how many of the incoming migrant workers are any better endowed in that department than the indigenous unemployed who are so airliy dismissed as being permanently unemployable?

Well, she’s Italian/Dutch/Scottish/English going back two generations, so there’s no brown in there, you’ll be happy to know.

“All the data in this comes from the ONS.”

“As noted in the article, the major flaw in Balanced Migration’s press release is that they treat the data for net increases in employment as if it were data for job creation i.e. new jobs.

This is incorrect. New jobs are being created all the time, even during a recession, it just that during a recession more existing jobs are typically lost than new one are created and net employment falls.”

So the argument is one of semantics. If they had used the term ‘net rise in employment’ would that alter your assessment of the validity of their argument?

“There are other problems which stem from treating the data as if is showed a single linear trend, rather than one consisting of two distinct phases, 97-03 and 04-08, and from the inclusion of data from Q2 2008 to Q1 2009 without the essential qualification that this data relates to the current recession and, therefore, marks a break in the previous trend which needs to be treated rather differently.”

This is rather baffling as an objection since the accompanying chart in the BM press release allows the reader to make those distinctions for himself.

It does beg the question: have you actually seen the research report which lies behind the BM press release, and reviewed their data and methodology? Have you, for that matter, seen the actual OECD report that is referred to at the beginning of the article? If not, how are you able to dismiss the Mail’s report about its content so categorically?

One of the principal objections raised in the original article is that immigration restrictionists too often focus on the country of birth of foreign migrant workers as opposed to their nationality. The thinking appears to be that this unfairly characterises memebsr of the labour force who were migrants at one time but have since become naturalised UK citizens, while at the same time inflating the numbers of foreign migrant workers. A secondary complaint is that people concerned about labour migration refer to ‘new jobs’ rather than ‘net change in employment’.

The second is easily avoided and the first is also quite easily accomplished since the available statistics provide both data on migrant labour by both country of birth and by nationality. I for one am not at all bashful about sharing my sources, and am in fact happy to do so, since in such an emotive subject area it is all too easy for adversaries to make accusations of sleight of hand if the figures are produced out of a hat, as it were.

So, in the following my single source has been the Migrant Worker statistics that are compiled as part of the quarterly Labour Force Survey (LFS), and available from this link:

http://www.statistics.gov.uk/StatBase/Product.asp?vlnk=15137

Click on “Quarterly LFS Migrant Worker Estimates, May 2009” to access the xls tables which I used to derive the following information.

A further bone of contention appears to be that restrictionists are failing to take a nuanced view of the changes in the labour market during the period of the NuLabor regime. Unity suggests that we shouldn’t treat the data …

“…as if is showed a single linear trend, rather than one consisting of two distinct phases, 97-03 and 04-08, and from the inclusion of data from Q2 2008 to Q1 2009 without the essential qualification that this data relates to the current recession and, therefore, marks a break in the previous trend which needs to be treated rather differently.”

So we won’t, we will be partition it as he he suggests, as well as showing the big picture over the entire period from 1997 to early 2009.

1. Considering the first stage, from Q1 1997 to Q4 2003 inclusive, we see the following:

- Over the period there was a net increase of 2.076 million. If we apply the country of birth (CoB) criterion, the net increase in UK employment was 1.435 million or 69%, and non UK-born acounted for 31%.

- Applying the nationality criterion, the UK contribution to net employment was 1.604 million, or 77% which is, as expected an increase. The increase of around 170,000 in UK employment represents the number of ‘switchers’, that is migrants who became naturalised over the period. It is an interesting exercise to analyse the countries of origin of these switchers, one that we’ll perhaps return to later.

Being unsure of the character limit imposed on humble commenters here, I’ll pause here for the moment.

…
?
2. Continuing with the second stage, from Q1 2004 up to and including Q1 2008, we can detect the impact of opening the labour market to the eight EU accession states:

- Overall employment rose by 1.079 million, while UK-born employment fell by 10,000. By that measure migrant workers accounted for 100% of all new employment over the period. Nearly half of the net increase was due to A8; migrants from Africa nd the Indian subcontinent accounted for another quarter.

- Using nationality as the criterion increases the UK share of the net increase to 225,000 or around 21%. There were around 235,000 nationality ‘switchers’ during the period.

3. The period from Q2 2008 up to including Q1 2009 reflects the recessionary trend, at least for UK workers. It’s unsurprising that immigration promoters would wish to airbrush this period out of the picture, since the figures are actually quite damning:

- Overall employment fell by 345,000 during the period, although employment of UK-born feel even further, by 449,000. In contrast, non-UK born employment actually rose, by 98,000.

- The employment of workers with UK nationality also fell, by 401,000. Here too, employment of workers with non-UK nationality rose, by 53,000.

4. Finally, taking the period of period of NuLabor as a whole, from Q! 1997 to Q1 2009 overall employment rose by 2.850 million. Of this, UK-born workers accounted for 958,000, or 34%. Using the nationality criterion the corresponding figure is 50%, which reflects the contribution of the 461,000 former migrants who have achieved British citizenship and entered the labour force during the Labour years.

Although figures don’t confirm Balnced Migration’s claim that overall employment of UK-born has fallen under Labour, they do support their contention that about two thirds of all new employment is accounted for by non UK-born workers. I don’t have data to verify or refute their comments about the split between public and private sector employment so cannot comment on that.

All that said, it’s a little unclear what Unity is beefing is about.

It was rather disappointing not to find a rousing rendition of the economic argument for mass immigration offered as part of this installment of the series. Unity’s effort was rather lack-lustre, amounting to a pro-forma recitation of the now-standard NuLabor litany combined with with a gratuitous swipe at Migrationwatch UK:

“… So, contrary to what MigrationWatch UK had said in 2002, there was an economic case for ‘large scale inward migration’ – without it the growth in the UK economy would at least have slowed dramatically, if not stopped dead in its tracks. It could even have moved the UK into recession, four years before the crisis in the banking and financial services industry actually tipped the UK over the edge.”

Taking 2003 as a baseline, the UK economy grew by 11.8% over the period 2004-2008, according to Eurostat. It may be instructive to compare the UK with France and Germany, two countries which placed a five-year moratorium on migrant workers from the A8 countries. Neither country has a work-permit system either like that of the UK which facilitates the entry of migrant workers from outside the EEA. So how did they did do? Well, not as well as the UK, but not bad considering: Germany’s GDP grew by 9.3% and France’s by 9.6%. Might the UK’s edge be explained by the 1.25 million migrant workers it imported (421,000 from the EU-A8 and 766,000 from outside the EEA)? Well perhaps, adding more people to the population should, in theory, expand GDP, although correlation is not necessarily causation.

But that aside, perhaps a more telling parameter as to economic benefit is the effect that migration has upon GDP per capita. That is, does it make everyone relatively richer, not just migrants who obviously gain otherwise they wouldn’t turn up, but also the settled population as well? Unfortunately in the case of the UK it appears not, at least according to Eurostat. GDP per capita in the UK declined from 121.7 to 117.2, expressed as a percentage of the EU-27 average, calculated at pps. The French figure also declined as well, from 111.7 to 107.4, while the Germans stayed about the same at 116.1 (116.5 in 2003).

It’s easy to see why Unity’s heart wasn’t in it – this dog don’t hunt as they say in down-home Alabammy.

Well I guess that’s it from my end for the time being so ‘over and out’.

Wow, it looks like for once, they have nothing to say Dan Dare.

Most peculiar.

“They don’t like it up ‘em Mr. Mainwaring, Sir!”

…or possibly Unity wasn’t up between midnight and 3AM?

@16 those measures don’t make sense.

UK GDP per capita rose at the same 2% trend rate from 2004-2007 that it had been showing for the previous 20ish years.

The extent to which UK and French GDP were larger than average EU per capita GDP (which is what your data actually measures) fell over the same period solely because CEE countries grew even faster than western Europe, because they were much poorer to start with. I suspect the reason this didn’t happen in Germany relates to the fact that former East Germany is in a similar position.

I’m not particularly au fait with Confederate colloquialisms, but you can insert a suitable one here if you like.

[snark] wow, it looks like for once CF and DD have nothing to say [/snark]

So the argument is one of semantics. If they had used the term ‘net rise in employment’ would that alter your assessment of the validity of their argument?

No, its a question of accuracy – net changes in employment and the number of new jobs are different metrics and cannot be used interchangeably. To do so creates a misleading picture of the dynamics of the labour market.

It was rather disappointing not to find a rousing rendition of the economic argument for mass immigration

Given access to the relevant Treasury models from 1997-2002/3 I might well have gone for it properly but as things stand you’ve rather missed the point of the criticism of Migration Watch UK, which isn’t based on the usual wrangling over cost-benefit analyses of the impact of migrant labour on actual economic performance from 2003-2008.

The cost-benefit debate is, in truth, rather like watching two bald men fighting over a comb because neither side has provided a complete analysis; one that takes into account the Treasury models which show alternative scenarios for economic performance based on different (i.e. lower) levels of inward migration.

In this case, those models assume particular importance because the actual labour market indicates that by during 2003/4 unemployment fell to what, for the UK economy, is its structural level – we effectively ran out of employable British-born workers, i.e. workers with the skills necessary to find jobs in the UK economy. When that happens, mainstream economic theory predicts that unless you can either find an alternative supply of labour (migrants) or compensate for the shortage of labour by raising productivity (which is very difficult in a heavily service-based economy) then economy is not only likely to stall but actually fall into recession.

As such, the benefits associated with the use foreign-born labour from 2003/4 onwards include the avoidance of the economic slowdown/recession that would have been precipitated had we not acted to address the impending labour shortage.

BTW, comparisons to France (which lifted its accession restrictions in 2008) and Germany (doesn’t open up to A8 until 2011) are of limited utility because their economies, and labour markets, are structured very differently to ours.

France has a much larger domestic market to lean on, particularly in agriculture, which is lavishly propped up by CAP and very restrictive internal labour laws which inhibit internal labour movements, let alone international ones. It was, and I think still is, the most overtly protectionist economy in the EU not to mention just about the most inventive when it comes to stitching up foreign competition in its domestic markets. There are a number of near legendary examples of French protectionist ingenuity of which perhaps the best is the one where they stitched up the Japanese by deliberately directing all the paperwork on imports of electronic consumer goods to a customs post in the Alps that consisted of two blokes and a St. Bernard.

Germany, on the other hand, has retained much more its manufacturing base and still has a sizeable but as yet largely untapped ‘native’ labour pool to draw on due to reunification in the mid 90’s.

Importantly, given the critical importance of labour market conditions to this particular debate, both had unemployment rates running at double that of the UK in 2003/4 and, therefore, much less of need to draw on foreign-born workers.

I haven’t heard terms like ‘scraping the top of the underclass’ since attending Young Consersative meetings in the 1960s. To depict one’s fellow countrymen, especially members of the working class, in such terms hardly reflects traditional liberal sensibilities I would have thought.

I wasn’t aware that ‘liberal’ meant being unable to acknowledge the existence of a social and economic underclass even if the evidence for it is staring you in the face.

[snark] wow, it looks like for once CF and DD have nothing to say [/snark]

[extrasnark] Probably expats [/extrasnark]

I have to say I find the least convincing aspect of the pro-economic migration case to be the notion that Migrant Workers are only necessary because the economy “ran out of British-born workers with the skills and experience necessary to fill the jobs that the growing economy was still creating”. It is linked in with the idea that “migrants are willing to do the work natives are not” – which is certainly true when one thinks of the stereotypical 12 hour shifts in meat packing factories, but not really in the case of other low skilled minimum wage jobs where some Migrant Workers are to be found.

The A8 migrants, for example, have largely been working for minimum wage in sectors of the economy – the accession monitoring report for example says that 67% of Migrant Workers have been working at minimum wage (or close to) in sectors such as Hospitality, Manufacturing, agriculture and “admin, business and management” (which is the category the accession monitoring report places agency workers – who could be employed in any sector). In other words there is an element of crossover in the types of jobs and sectors this group of Migrants have been working in and the types of jobs and sectors that are within reach of the “white working class”.

On the other hand I think this quote is the most important part of the article:

“despite the UK enjoying a near unprecedented period of sustained economic growth between 1997 and the beginning of 2008, the white working-class economy has spent that entire period in recession,”

This is something that matters, because it is a sad indictment of the British economic system (whatever you want to label that as).

I’m not necessarily convinced that low educational levels and an inability to adapt to a changing labour market are important factors here; most minimum wage jobs can be learned with basic training and are more dependent upon personality (customer service skills) than educational knowledge.

I think you are right that economic migration was necessary to prevent recession in 2004, but this isn’t the result a ‘natural’ rate of domestic capacity being reached, but because of a number of reasons that meant British workers were unable to fill vacancies. For example: I’m thinking here about the absurdities of the tax and benefits system meaning that it isn’t worthwhile for many people to take temporary minimum wage jobs. As migrant workers were not given access to the welfare state, minimum wage jobs remained an attractive option. Secondly a great deal of the vacancies, particularly seasonal agricultural work, are filled en mass by employment agencies who recruit their workforce from abroad and thus facilitate migration (which often creates exploitation). Thus natives have not really had the opportunity to apply for the jobs. Thirdly I think many employers have simply preferred relying on migrant workers because it is easier to exploit them and bring conditions down, rather than employ people from “white working class areas” where values such as trade unionism haven’t been entirely forgotten.

This isn’t to say that the case you make for the economic benefits of migration is wrong, I just think it is a bit more nuanced in the sense that migration was only necessary because of other structural factors that really need to be addressed.

This ‘immigration = economic’ benefit rubbish was demolished quite thoroughly by a quite a few independent reports just last year, including by a cross party nine month inquiry including Liberals, here is a tabloid summary of their findings:

“Lords’ report exposes Labour’s lies on the ‘benefits’ of mass immigration

Gordon Brown today rejected heavyweight calls for a cap on immigration…He dismissed a major report that attacked Government claims that migrants boost the economy

•Reject Government claims that foreigners will help to defuse the pensions timebomb;

•Demolish the “fundamentally flawed” Downing Street argument that migrants fill vacancies in the economy;

•And warn that migrants will force up house prices by 10 per cent in the next two decades.

His remarks came as the report, by the Lords economic affairs committee, which includes former Chancellors Nigel Lawson and Norman Lamont, economists and captains of industry, said immigration had had “little or no positive impact” on the living standards of the existing population.

In fact, the big winners were the migrants themselves who earn higher wages than in their homeland and can also send money home.

Some British workers were even seeing their incomes fall, while up to 100,000 youngsters have been unable to find work.

And, by pushing up house prices, migrants will keep young families off the housing ladder, the committee found.

With migration swelling the population by 190,000 every year, Labour has been keen to stress the economic benefits, not least over pensions.

But the peers said the argument did not “hold up to scrutiny” because the migrants will grow old and claim pensions of their own.

The committee has among its ranks Labour and Liberal Democrat members with impeccable economic and business credentials. Many of them were the most trenchant in their remarks…

“In the short term, immigration creates winners and losers in economic terms,” said the report. “The biggest winners include immigrants and their employers in the UK.

“The losers are likely to include those in low-paid jobs and directly competing with new immigrant workers.”

The destruction of the case for mass immigration leaves the Government in what critics say is an impossible position.

Ministers have accepted migrants are placing pressure on schools and hospitals, but have balanced this against the so-called “huge” economic benefits.
Now they will be forced to accept the social harm from migration, with little or nothing to fall back upon…

David Coleman, an Oxford University academic, says the wider costs of immigration are almost £8.8billion a year.

Professor Coleman said that the costs to the public sector are £1.5billion to run the asylum system, £280million to teach English to migrants and at least £330million to treat illnesses such as HIV.

Shadow Home Secretary David Davis said the report showed “unequivocally that the benefits of the current immigration policy to ordinary UK citizens are largely non-existent.

“There are a series of long-term risks to the economy, not least the disincentive to train, and it presents absolutely no answer to the pension crisis”.

The inquiry, which took nine months and runs to more than 500 pages of evidence, said the low-paid, some ethnic minorities and some young people looking for a foot on the job ladder may have suffered because of competition from immigrants.”

http://www.thisislondon.co.uk/news/article-23467548-lords-report-exposes-labours-lies-on-the-benefits-of-mass-immigration.do

“here is a tabloid summary of their findings”

Says it all really, you couldn’t even be bothered to link to the original report.

It says it all really; you couldn’t even be bothered to look for it yourself if you are so interested in the truth.

It says it all really; you couldn’t even be bothered to look for it yourself if you are so interested in the truth.

Neither could you, evidently, otherwise you might have noticed that the government published an official response to the HoL report which rejected many of its key findings and accused the committee of misrepresenting the government’s position.

HoL report – http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/ld200708/ldselect/ldeconaf/82/82.pdf

Government response – http://www.parliament.uk/documents/upload/GovernmentResponse.pdf

And there was also a debate in the Lords in November 2008 – http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/ld200708/ldhansrd/text/81114-0005.htm#08111465000004

One of the more pertinent passages in the government response if this one…

Government and independent research continues to find no
significant evidence of negative employment effects from immigration.
The Government’s views here are in line with the clear consensus among
most UK labour market economists that “the recent empirical research on
the labour market effects of immigration to the UK finds little evidence of
overall adverse effects of immigration on wages and employment for
people born in the UK”. In addition, a recent study by the Work
Foundation, reviewing data and evidence on the impact of A8 migration,
found that migrants have contributed to UK economic growth and have
not displaced British workers. It concludes that, in the absence of
migration, the UK would have experienced slower growth, higher inflation
and higher interest rates.

If we’re considering pertinent passeges in the government response to the HoL report, then one of the most pertinent is the following:

“The Government has been crystal clear that GDP per capita growth must be the principal determinant of success. Indeed, the Minister of State for Borders and Immigration said to the Committee: “I personally do think that GDP per capita is the key thing to focus on”..”

It then goes on to note that, according to a 2007 study commissioned for the Low Pay Commission, to claim that the contribution of migrants to GDP/capita growth is of the order of 0.15% annually.

The minister cited above offered the conclusion in evidence that the actual growth in GDP per capita amounted to an average of £30 per year over the ten years, a figure that led to the tabloid hilarity about the presence of migrants contributing ‘a Mars a week’ to the settled population.

I’ll return shortly shortly with a rebuttal to Unity’s comments about the comparisons between the UK, French and Germany, an area in which he he is seriously off-course.

@ Unity

**“Neither could you, evidently, otherwise you might have noticed that the government published an official response…”**

Did it really?

Would this be the same government who also published official reports about Iraqi Weapons of Mass Destruction and the 45 minute claim in order to take Britain to war?

Amongst many, many other lies.

That same government…

… That then goes on to publish a report that contrary to the findings an independent bi-partisan nine month inquiry by some of the countries leading experts and the findings of an Independent Oxford academic, actually supports the governments (that is they are the government!) position and generally pats themselves on the back for a job well done…

Those people you mean…

29. So they lie when it suits your argument, but they also tell the universal truth when it suits your argument…which is it to be?

This is one of those topics, like AGW, where the data is so mindblowingly, obviously in our favour that arguing with the idiots is actively counterproductive.

C’mon. These people aren’t just wrong, they’re morons who don’t understand or listen to what’s going on – they just hate immigrants and liberals. Rational debate is brilliant – but if someone isn’t worthy of it, then we shouldn’t be trying to bother troll-wrestling – rather we should be dealing with them LBJ-style.

The problem with bloody liberals (and god, I know I’m one) is that we can’t quite bear to do that as much as the other lot, more or less definitionally.

@ John B (19)

“… I suspect the reason this didn’t happen in Germany relates to the fact that former East Germany is in a similar position.”

I don’t know that the GDP per capita differential is any starker between the old West and East Germanies than it is between London and the SE and the rest of the UK. What the Eurostat figures show is that, during the period in question (2004-2008) when Britain was supposedly deriving a competitive advantage thanks to its decision to admit the workers from the EU-A8, its *relative* economic performance on the key indicator of GDP per capita worsened in relation to the rest of the EU, while Germany’s did not.

Actually Britain’s relative performance in 2004-2008 was almost exactly the same as between 1997 and 2003 indicating that admitting the EU-A8 workers made no difference at all to the per capita income of Britons vis-vis everybody else in the EU. ?
(31)

“This is one of those topics, like AGW, where the data is so mindblowingly, obviously in our favour that arguing with the idiots is actively counterproductive.”

In the perhaps forelorn hope that John B might refrain from bile-spewing mode for an instant and deal in reasoned argument as opposed to hyperventilating invective, I wonder if he might see his way clear to providing a non-girlyman response to the following.

1. During the period of the NuLabor regime from 1997 to the present around 1.9 million migrant workers have entered the UK labour force, accounting for around two thirds of the net increase in employment over that period.

2. The economic performance of the UK, when measured by growth in GDP and GDP per capita over this period is slightly better than France and Germany, two economic competitors which have chosen not to admit foreign workers on the same scale as the UK.

3. According to the government’s figures the annual improvement in GDP and GDP per capita attributable to migrants over this period is around 0.5% and 0.15%, respectively.

4. Again, acording to the government, the effective annual increase in GDP per capita attributable to migrants has been £30 per year, or 58p per week.

5. LFS figures indicate that, during the recessionary period which commenced in Q2 2008, migrant workers are increasing their share of the available employment at the expense of UK workers.

6. There is no compelling evidence that NuLabor’s immigration ‘policy’ has delivered any meaningful benefit to the settled population of the UK, unless one considers that the standard package of ethnic cuisine, exciting new dance syncopations and colourful new dress styles constitute a benefit in as of themselves.

@ Lee Griffin

Once again your comment is totally devoid of any foundation in reality; nowhere have I held this dishonest, corrupt and traitorous shower of shit up as any beacon of integrity.

I have pointed out areas that even they have had to admit were badly broken, but only because of overwhelming evidence and because they couldn’t lie and cover it up anymore.

But I note beyond this silly little jibe, you have nothing of anything substance to say on the matter.

None of you do. Funny that…

@Unity (21)

“… [M]ainstream economic theory predicts that unless you can either find an alternative supply of labour (migrants) or compensate for the shortage of labour by raising productivity (which is very difficult in a heavily service-based economy) then economy is not only likely to stall but actually fall into recession.[/quote]

Please provide a citation to support the assertion that productivity increases are very difficult to achieve in a heavily service-based economy in the absence of large-scale immigration, and that economies that don’t resort to such measures are likely to stall and fall into recession. If possible please cite an independent source that is not aligned with the NuLabor regime, which would naturally exclude the IPPR.

“As such, the benefits associated with the use foreign-born labour from 2003/4 onwards include the avoidance of the economic slowdown/recession that would have been precipitated had we not acted to address the impending labour shortage.”

I’m aware that’s one of the claims made by the government but where is the independent proof? The continued recitation of articles of faith simply does not persuade.

It’s also necessary to properly explain how both France and Germany managed to avoid inflation, slowdown and recession while at the same time declining to admit migrant labour, especially from the A8, on anywhere near the scale that Britain has. I know you have claimed that such comparisons have ‘limited utility’ but that is simply a dodge that I refute below.

“BTW, comparisons to France (which lifted its accession restrictions in 2008) and Germany (doesn’t open up to A8 until 2011) are of limited utility because their economies, and labour markets, are structured very differently to ours.”

Actually, they are not. Both Germany and France are both heavily service based, as is of course the UK. In terms of value-added, the service sector accounts for 77% of the economy in both France and Britain, and 69% in Germany, the lower relative size of the service sector in the latter being accounted for by the manufacturing sector which is relatively twice as large as in France or the UK. Taken together, the other non-service sectors in Germany (i.e. construction and agriculture) are relatively smaller in Germany than in Britain.

“France has a much larger domestic market to lean on, particularly in agriculture, which is lavishly propped up by CAP …”

I’m unsure what the term ‘larger’ means, the GDP of France and Britain are practically the same. The populations are also about the same and GDP per capita (at pps) is also very similar . The French agricultural sector is twice as large as the UK, but even then it only accounts for 2% of the total value-added. As for the CAP, it is true that France is the single largest net beneficiary (Ireland is the largest on a per capita basis), however CAP receipts, which amount to around 10 billion Euros, represent less than 0.5% of French GDP. It is also important to recognise that agriculture has a far greater emotional and cultural significance in France (an ungovernable nation which produces over 400 cheeses, complained de Gaulle) than it does in Britain. Agriculture in France has a totemic significance similar to that enjoyed by domestic rice producers in Japan, who are especially revered even though what they deliver costs several times what it might fetch on the world market. CAP largesse reflects this legacy to a large degree however, contrary to popular wisdom and CAP receipts notwithstanding, France like Britain is a significant net contributor to the EU (both contributing over 50 million Euros more annually than they receive ).

“[France has] very restrictive internal labour laws which inhibit internal labour movements, let alone international ones. It was, and I think still is, the most overtly protectionist economy in the EU not to mention just about the most inventive when it comes to stitching up foreign competition in its domestic markets.”

Yes there is probably a lot we could learn from the neighbours if only we could free ourselves from the mental straitjacket of doctrinaire ‘Anglo-Saxon’free-market dogma, of which the open-borders lunacy is merely one piece.

“Germany, on the other hand, has retained much more its manufacturing base and still has a sizeable but as yet largely untapped ‘native’ labour pool to draw on due to reunification in the mid 90’s.”

Well, reunification happened in 1990 not the mid-90s, so going on for twenty years ago now. As a matter of fact, cities in the former East Germany such as Dresden (where I spent a most interesting couple of months last year) and Leipzig are amongst the most dynamic in the whole of Germany. For sure there are still backward areas such as in the more rural areas of Mecklenburg-Vorpommern and perhaps Thüringen or Sachsen-Anhalt but in general it’s getting quite difficult to discern these days where the West ended and the East began. There are areas of post-industrial dereliction in the East for sure, but Cottbus and Eisenhüttenstadt are not qualitatively different to Duisburg and Oberhausen in that respect.

The role of manufacturing in a modern economy is an interesting theme, one which has sociological as well as economic implications. In the EU as a whole, manufacturing is one of the more efficient economic sectors as far as labour utilisation is concerned, contributing 20% of the value-added while representing only 17% of employment. The only other sector which exhibits such a relationship is financial services. In a sense we can consider these two sectors as being capital intensive, while all the others are labour intensive. The German economy derives 55% of its value-add from these two sectors, France 47% and the UK, thanks to its dominant financial sector, 51%. The UK’s position would be similar to France’s were it not for the bonus of North Sea oil and gas, which represents around a sixth of Britain’s industrial output.

The value of manufacturing from a societal perspective is that, as Unity noted earlier, it provides the bulk of traditional blue-collar jobs which are more suited to the attributes of the half of the population that lies on the left-hand side of the IQ bell curve. Not everyone is cut out to be a talk show host, a derivatives trader or celebrity hairdresser. Those people who in earlier years might have found a well-paid and fulfilling career in an industry which actually produced something tangible in which a worker might take personal pride now find themselves facing the choice of a career in Macdonalds or stocking the shelves at Tesco.

The plain fact of the matter is that the UK’s economy is structurally imbalanced compared to its main competitors and the over-reliance on financial services as well as the other lower-skilled labour intensive sectors (Horeca, transport and distribution etc) has worked to the detriment of the indigenous working class and stimulated the importation of cheaper, more pliant labour.

“Importantly, given the critical importance of labour market conditions to this particular debate, both had unemployment rates running at double that of the UK in 2003/4 and, therefore, much less of need to draw on foreign-born workers.’

Yes I agree that is correct, but official unemployment figures tell only part of the story, at least in the UK. More relevant for the big picture is the number of economically inactive which has remained above 7.5 million for several years now and is now approaching 8 million, of whom 2.25 million would like a job and a further 2 million plus are ‘on the sick’. Many of the youth who are now enrolled in half-baked bullshit courses at second- and third-rate colleges should really be included in the unemployed stats as well.

On the other side of the coin are the figures for employment itself. Over the period 2004-2008 the percentage of people over 15 in employment was 53% in Germany, 52% in France and 59% in Britain. The British figures are inflated by the relatively large numbers of 15-19 year-olds and over 65s in employment; taking the core 20-64 cohort only, the figures are much more evenly matched at 72%, 72% and 75%, respectively. One important difference is the number of unemployed who are participaring in publically-funded training or retraining opportunities. In Germany around 1.5 million of the economically inactive are taking part in such schemes, and around 550,000 in France. The corresponding figure for the UK is 39,000. This succinctly demonstrates which of these governments are biting the bullet in tackling structural unemployment, and which one is taking the easy route of importing migrant labour.

“I wasn’t aware that ‘liberal’ meant being unable to acknowledge the existence of a social and economic underclass even if the evidence for it is staring you in the face.”

It’s one thing to acknowledge its existence and another entirely to dismiss it as a lost cause as you appear to be doing. Wouldn’t you agree that the first responsibility of a national government is to its own people, and a large part of that responsibility entails creating an environment in which as many of them as possible can become economically productive citizens? Or perhaps you’d agree with TGWU chief and Labour Party treasurer Jack Dromey that the indigenous population are owed no special favours and must take their place along with all the other supplicants within the ranks of the global reserve labour army? Somebody else had a similar worldview once, chap by the name of Marx as I recall.

Here’s Jack in fine fettle, holding forth on the subject of “British Jobs for British Workers”.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y6IFrd-9Z4s

The talking starts about 2 minutes in.

Its all very quiet in here, I can almost hear the echo of ‘bullshit’…

And another thing …

There’s an even more important aspect of the economic argument that almost never gets aired. All discussion about the economic aspects of immigration centres around its fiscal effects (i.e. tax receipts and expenditures) and GDP (sometimes also GDP per capita). These are all concerned with revenue and expenses, what we might term the current account or the income statement in a commercial enterprise. The capital account (assets and liabilities) is practically ignored and yet this is the area of the national accounts in which the negative impact of immigration is perhaps the greatest. Some of the academic restrictionists (Coleman and Rowthorn in particular) as well MWUK do flag this as an issue, but as far as I know there has been only one attempt at quantifying the capital cost of supporting immigrants.

In 2007 the Social Affairs Unit published a report by Anthony Scholefield which attempted to place a cost on the infrastructure and the ‘tools of production’ with which an immigrant must be equipped:

“… When an immigrant steps off an aeroplane in London or New York, he arrives in a country whose native inhabitants have accumulated capital and wealth over generations and centuries. From the moment of arrival, he makes use of this wealth – the airports, the roads, the water supplies. Later, he requires the ‘tools of production’, housing, health services, churches, colleges and cultural institutions, etc”.

Scholefield estimates that the capital cost of the infrastructure that must be created for each new immigrant amounts to £141,000, or £282,000 for a family of four. He calculates that few if any migrants generate can ever generate sufficient added-value during their working lives to reimburse this capital cost. Those few migrants who earn considerably more than the average income tend to be temporary, typically people transferred here to perform a particular managerial or specialist technical function on behalf of their employers, and who then get transferred back home or on to somewhere else. The temporary presence of such migrants tends to skew the fiscal effects; permanent migrants cluster at the poorer end of the spectrum, as a quick glance at the list of source countries providing the overwhelming majority of new permanent residents will confirm.

The full report can be seen here:

http://socialaffairsunit.org.uk/digipub/content/view/18/

@32-36

I can hear the echo of ‘bullshit’…

Hey! You know what? I take it all back, the points based system really works!

I just performed the self-assessment exercise at the UK Border Agency website and got the great news that I am qualified to enter the UK as a ‘highly skilled migrant’ under Tier 1 of the PBS, without even needing to have an actual job lined up.

I described myself as a 25 year old Indian (worth 20 points), who graduated in 2006 with a master’s degree in non-traditional medicine from the Swami Vivekanand Yoga Anusandhana Institute in Karnataka (I just picked it with a pin but hey, still good for 35 points). My past earnings of £23,000 (actually about a fifth of when expressed in rupees adjusted for the prevailing local earning levels) counted for 20 points, meaning that I’d attained the magic 75 score which opens all doors.

The English language requirement (another 10 points) was satisfied after I declared the course had been taught in English (who’s going to check?) and I’m sure I’ll be able to scrounge up the £2,800 necessary to get the 10 points for ‘maintenance’. I’ll borrow it from my relatives in Brent and as soon as the visa comes through they can have it back.

I’ll soon be making good money anyway waiting on in one of Uncle’s curry emporia. Life is good!

I’ll soon be making good money anyway waiting on in one of Uncle’s curry emporia. Life is good!

Which is just as well, because I won’t be eligible for any state support.

Damn. If only these foreigners weren’t coming over here and making delicious curries which they’re FORCING US AT GUNPOINT to buy and eat, thus creating enough profit for them to need to hire people who have an understanding of the self-same food, who largely live in India.

And when I turn up with my GCSE in Woodwork and no knowledge of Indian cooking, do they give me the job? Do they hell.

@ Sevillista

I thought you were very silent here! What’s wrong? Run out of lies and fake quotes?

Go ahead then gobby, prove your silly little jibe is correct…

Surely you are not just full of shit?(!!)

@39

Yeah too true mate. It’s a well known fact that only Indians understand how to make a truly great chicken tikka masala. It’s all in the genes innit?

Indian cookery for Indian* workers, that’s what I say. Once you let foreigners get their nose in the door the next thing we know Scotsmen’ll be hankering after Michelin stars for French cuisine instead of deep frying Mars bars. Fat bloody chance!

[* Aren’t around 95% of ‘Indian’ restaurants run by Bangladeshis? Ed.]

@curious

“Go ahead then gobby, prove your silly little jibe is correct…”

You’re touchy.

I was confirming an earlier posting someone made @35, which was of course not in any way a “silly little jibe”.

” I can almost hear the echo of ‘bullshit’…”

There’s no point engaging with someone who has no interest in engaging (ref your 6 childish ” single word of your latest long winded gibberish…whilst you are busy here at least you are not practising your hatred somewhere else or shoving shit through someone’s letter box.” posts on the previous thread http://www.liberalconspiracy.org/2009/11/27/the-truth-about-immigration-asylum-part-2/#comment-88183 ).

You’ve lost the argument and been caught out lying about your agenda (see http://shirazsocialist.wordpress.com/2009/10/24/bnp-on-question-time-what-would-have-been-the-point-of-banning-griffin/#comment-26966 where you admit ““”that is exactly why as an indigenous English white working class heterosexual male I put my cross in the BNP box” and claim that ““I was ethnically cleansed from the East End”, so you resort to insults. I pity you for having to carry your burden of hatred around permanently – it must be hard for you.

I fully expect you to continue with your childish insults, but that’s because you have nothing
to say.

Obviously the first quote was “you have nothing to contribute bar dishonesty and hysterical nonsense.”. I apologise for
misquoting you Mr Curious.

Look on the bright side – you can focus just on this in your reply. Happy raging.

@ Sevillista

Well, thanks for that confirmation that indeed, as per usual, you have nothing to contribute bar dishonesty and hysterical nonsense.

Nada. Zero. Zilch.

I’m really not sure why you think regurgitating a link to Shiraz Socialist ad nausea is some kind of achievement or discovery when I posted the link to that “debate” here on LC myself, several times in fact and that is how you came upon it. That is the only reason you are able to post it.

“You’ve lost the argument and been caught out lying about your agenda… where you admit…” you claim.

Have a little think about these two statements and how absurd they are; how can have I been “caught out” when I have been very upfront by own estimation? (And I don’t have to “admit” anything in any case”) and consequently the only lie told here is by, yet again, you.

And of course, you take a few words without context from the thousands on that ‘debate’ in the typically dishonest way that you do; in fact the last statement is covered by an entire detailed and reasoned post.

It can be found in this thread:

http://www.liberalconspiracy.org/2009/11/27/the-truth-about-immigration-asylum-part-2

Every single word true; but that is of no concern to the PC fanatic likes of you.

You have merely reminded me why I stopped reading yourcomments: Complete dishonesty and a distinct lack of substance.

It’s a policy I shall now resume.

@curious

“when I posted the link to that “debate” here on LC myself, several times in fact and that is how you came upon it”

Whatever. I googled it as I suspected you had been less cautious and damned yourself elsewhere.

“how can have I been “caught out” when I have been very upfront by own estimation?”

You have not come clean about being a BNP hack and claim not to be a racist. The thread I link to shows both of these would be good descriptions of you.

“you take a few words without context”

What context would you like from that thread? Most of it the thread you are swearing and insulting people (big surprise), and the rest you are claiming that skin colour is the key driver of most crimes.

“Every single word true”

The whole thread shows that not to be true – that’s why you moved onto your childish insults and “I didn’t read any of that” comments. You’ve even provided a link so people can see that.

“the PC fanatic likes of you”

You obviously do not grasp the concept of political correctness do you? I am stating factual evidence that disproves your wild assertions. I am stating my true beliefs, not pretending to believe things for social acceptability reasons. I am not trying to prevent you saying things I consider racist. Quite the opposite – it is good to expose your ridiculous assertion based arguments for not being rooted in any factual evidence.

“Complete dishonesty and a distinct lack of substance”

You don’t seem to grasp that the factual evidence I provide is far superior to the fact-free assertions you continually make.

“It’s a policy I shall now resume.”

Please do. It is clear you have nothing to say.

Again, just more fantastic lies from you.

I posted the links to that ‘debate’ here several times here because that ‘debate’ spilled over the Shiraz from here and that is where you got if from, not from any spurious Google search.

I had made my position perfectly clear on this blog:

http://www.liberalconspiracy.org/2009/10/25/spot-the-difference-2/

As well as posting the resultant links to the debate so it is just more dishonesty from you, as is the ‘racist’ crap.

As is your idiotic lying claim that “Most of it the thread you are swearing and insulting people” not even remotely true; just a complete fabrication.

As is your claim to use “facts” when you haven’t presented one single fact here at all.

You really just a nasty dishonest piece of work.

@curious

“I posted the links to that ‘debate’ here several times here because that ‘debate’ spilled over the Shiraz from here and that is where you got if from, not from any spurious Google search.”

You think I’m not going to check what you say out?

Where on earth is this “link” you provided?

The only reference you make to it is in response to someone accusing you of dumping comments across the 2 sites “I love the self righteous tone of anger you employ for my practicing of free speech, how amusing. I haven’t “dumped” anything, unless you consider all comments to be dumped rather then posted” http://www.liberalconspiracy.org/2009/10/25/spot-the-difference-2/#comment-71417

How is that “a link”?

“I had made my position perfectly clear on this blog:”

Where do you either a) Admit to being a BNP voter b) Claim to have been ethnically cleansed from East London c) claim that skin colour is the key factor in crime in that thread. You’ve been caught out making stuff up yet again.

“As is your idiotic lying claim that “Most of it the thread you are swearing and insulting people” not even remotely true; just a complete fabrication.”

I’ve read the thread. The link is there for all to see. You are clearly talking rubbish and most of that thead you insult people and think using a lot of swear words bolsters your argument. How stupid do you think people are?

“as is the ‘racist’ crap”

You say over and over again on the thread that the colour of someone’s skin is the key driver of crime. That is racist. You are right the sentiment you were expressing is “racist crap”, but I’m not sure you meant that.

“As is your claim to use “facts” when you haven’t presented one single fact here at all.”

You presented links you say disproved what I said. It turns out you were lying and hoped they would not be checked. What a surprise.

@ Sevillista

As to be fully expected, every single word you post above is a lie. Every single word.

And by the frequency and timings you appear online, I, along with the rest of the taxpayer seem to be footing the bill for your anti-British activities too.

You are merely a liar, smear monger and quote assigner with the hugest of chips on your shoulder.

Chips always get knocked off eventually though.

@curious

“As to be fully expected, every single word you post above is a lie. Every single word.”

Whatever. You don’t seem to be able to find any concrete examples (now there’s a surprise – story of your contributions to this). That’s telling.

“And by the frequency and timings you appear online, I, along with the rest of the taxpayer seem to be footing the bill for your anti-British activities too.”

What exactly are you accusing me of – it’s unclear? Every
one of my posts on this thread has been in the evening. And you have made twice as many postings as me, and have posted during the UK working
day (assuming you are not abroad and a UK immigrant to another country).

And how is pointing out the many ways in which your arguments are at odds with the facts anti-British? Are we British stupid people who should not concern ourselves with facts and just stick to blind tribal xenophobia and racism based on fear of the outsider?

“You are merely a liar, smear monger and quote assigner with the hugest of chips on your shoulder.”

Again with your groundless accusations – you say the words but there is no substance. At least you’re done with swearing copiously at me in every post like on the other thread. And as for me having a chip on my shoulder – read your posts. I am calmly demonstrating how what you say is demonstrably wrong, you are ranting and raving like someone who is very close to losing their mind. You should get help.

@ Sevillista

Once more, to tedium, and to be fully expected, every single word you post above is a lie. Every single word.

And by the frequency and timings you appear online, I, along with the rest of the taxpayer seem to be footing the bill for your anti-British activities too.

You are merely a liar, smear monger and quote assigner with the hugest of chips on your shoulder.

Chips always get knocked off eventually though.

@curious

The racist Emperor doesn’t like being told he’s wearing no clothes eh?

@ Sevillista

And once more, to tedium, and to be fully expected, every single word you post above is a lie. Every single word.

And by the frequency and timings you appear online, I, along with the rest of the taxpayer seem to be footing the bill for your anti-British activities too.

You are merely a liar, smear monger and quote assigner with the hugest of chips on your shoulder.

Chips always get knocked off eventually though.

@curious

“every single word you post above is a lie.”

So the racist Emperor likes being told he’s wearing no clothes but is constantly furious anyway?

@ Sevillista

….once more, to tedium, and to be fully expected, every single word you post above is a lie. Every single word.

And by the frequency and timings you appear online, I, along with the rest of the taxpayer seem to be footing the bill for your anti-British activities too.

You are merely a liar, smear monger and quote assigner with the hugest of chips on your shoulder.

Chips always get knocked off eventually though.

@curious

I know – why not just repeat the same bullshit post that has been taken apart over and over again because that proves you’re right doesn’t it?

around 20% of the potential adult workforce has a level of functional literacy that renders them incapable of correctly interpreting the instructions on a bottle of Calpol.

Yep, after 12 years of Labour education policy. Sad, innit?

@ Sevillista

.….once more, to tedium, and to be fully expected, every single word you post above is a lie. Every single word.

And by the frequency and timings you appear online, I, along with the rest of the taxpayer seem to be footing the bill for your anti-British activities too.

You are merely a liar, smear monger and quote assigner with the hugest of chips on your shoulder.

Chips always get knocked off eventually though.

You keep getting deleted FOR A REASON.

Deal with it and move on.

Who do you think you are hoffman? Some self-appointed arbitrator? You are deleted far more often then I am.

The difference is you are deleted for foul mouthed abuse whereas I am deleted purely to censor.

What a egocentric fool you are, thinking the world and everything revolves around you!

Deal with your own issues and move on.

Curious would never, ever stoop to foul-mouthed abuse.

http://www.liberalconspiracy.org/2009/11/27/the-truth-about-immigration-asylum-part-2/#comment-87538

“You see there you go again making up your own fucking story; I didn’t say that either fucknut; I haven’t said fuck all on it at all you lying fucking idiot. Not a fucking word. You lying fucking twat”

Delightful and articulate gentleman he is.

Curious Freedom,

Does indeed, have a curious freedom….

@ Sevillista

You reap what you sow. You got exactly the reaction you were looking for with your non-stop lies and smears. You should be very proud, you are a shit stirrer extraordinaire.

(But if you really want real foul mouthed abuse DHG is your man; he will go into expletive ridden rants about rape, your dead mother, your incestuous father and murder amongst other things with no problems at all.)

And you still haven’t contributed one single fact to this thread, and neither has the other two above.

@ douglas clark

Yes, you save your foul abuse for your alter-ego “Mr F”; your abusive sock puppet that wouldn’t fool a 5 year old.

The level of hypocrisy and detritus here is astounding.

@curious

Haha. I bow down to the superiority of bigotry and xenophobia that you bring compared with the documented evidence I provide.

I would wish you Happy Christmas but I’m not sure if you would consider the birth of a an olive-skinned Palestinian Prophet of Islam to be worthy of celebration. Maybe the Winter Solistice is more what you celebrate rather than this strange Roman religion that immigrants brought over forcing the poor ethnic English into worship of an Arab. Happy Solistice then.

Sevillista

> Happy Christmas …birth of a an olive-skinned Palestinian Prophet of Islam

Don’t know what carols you’ve been singing :<)
– but the ones I recall are about birth of jesus as son of god – which is heresy to Islam.

Although they do indeed claim him as a prophet of their own – just not the same jesus christianity would recognise (not the son of god, no virgin birth, Jesus spoke the moment he was born – just to name a few differences

@64

It is the same Jesus – he is the Messiah to both faiths and performed the same miracles.

Christians believe he was the son of God, Muslims give him similar status to Moses as a messenger of God, most of the UK population believes he was just a Palestinian carpenter.

I don’t really get your point.

Curious Freedom @ 62.

Ask the owners of this web site or something. I can assure you I have only ever published stuff under my own name. That would be douglas clark. I have no idea who ‘Mr F’ might be.

I publish stuff under my own name because I think only lying tits publish under pseudonyms. And I stand for what I say, unlike people called stuff like ‘Curious Freedom’.

Nuff said….

And, anyway, what ‘foul abuse’?

I have said nothing on this thread that justifies that comment.

“Does indeed, have a curious freedom….”

does not constitute ‘foul abuse’ you complete utter tit….

Curious Freedom,

Who is this mysterious ‘Mr F’ who apparently hasn’t even posted on this thread?

I think we should be told.

Curious Freedom is actually a blogger called The Sentinel, a notorious, BNP, racist type with a desperate desire for the last word at all costs, delusional behaviour and a lot of unprocessed anger that he takes out on the Internet.

All very interesting I’m sure: A compulsive liar, an English hating Scottish racist and a complete paranoid nut obsessed with some “sentnel” character lining up to assume the moral high ground, but the reality is that not one of you have actually been able to contribute one single fact to this thread, just nonsensical abuse.

Sevillista: You are as weird as you are dishonest

douglas clark: Your lack of comprehension is as obvious as your racism; the abuse referred to here that did not come from your sock puppet “Mr F” was about Hoffmann and his online hate campaigns including laughing about rape, incest and peoples dead mothers along with extreme abuse; if you are really that interested google it or go to his website and you will find loads of links to his nasty little world.

Daniel Hoffmann-Gill: Having googled you when you first starting accusing me of spoofing you when it was apparent you were spoofing yourself, me and others, the general consensus online seems to be that you are a complete nut even by internet standards with a penchant for depraved abuse and that you are completely obsessed with this “sentnel” character; I have seen your many posts about him and your obsession with him appears regularly in the googled threads I looked at; I think I saw you accuse about 5 different people of being this character. You are certifiable. You see him everywhere. You need help.

@curious

.….once more, to tedium, and to be fully expected, every single word you post above is a lie. Every single word.

And by the frequency and timings you appear online, I, along with the rest of the taxpayer seem to be footing the bill for your anti-British activities too.

You are merely a liar, smear monger and quote assigner with the hugest of chips on your shoulder.

Chips always get knocked off eventually though.

HA!

Sentinel, for someone so certain of their arguments, your desperate need to have the last word speaks volumes about your lack of faith in yourself and your ideas.

On the Internet at 3.46am on Christmas Eve? Bloody hell, you odd little web creature and happy to see you’ve had to hide your web profile, as well as your putrid little blog you crass racist.

Sevillista and others, to get a good idea of the type of troll The Sentinel is, have a read of this.

Merry Christmas!

@curious

..….once more, to tedium, and to be fully expected, every single word you post above is a lie. Every single word.

And by the frequency and timings you appear online, I, along with the rest of the taxpayer seem to be footing the bill for your anti-British activities too.

You are merely a liar, smear monger and quote assigner with the hugest of chips on your shoulder.

Chips always get knocked off eventually though.

Curious Freedom,

Can you understand this?

I do not think I am trolling. Neither do I think I have attacked you. Could you point to a case in point where you have not already attacked me? Could we start from here:

“You say it wasn’t you, well, whatever. I couldn’t care less. If it was you know the depths you have stooped to on a poxy blog, if it wasn’t then it were a very odd coincidence..Either ways, it is of no real importance…”

It is you who seems to protest just that little bit too much…

Err.

No.

—————————————————————————————————

It was you that said I had a sock puppet called Mr F.

It is pretty obvious that I’d deny that on the grounds that I don’t.

It is you, Sir, That protests too much.