This piece is incoherent on a whole bunch of points but let’s start with the fact that this labour govt introduced 5 very restricitve immigration bills and has been consistenly “tough” on immigration and had consistently refused to counter right wing rhetoric or argue the case for immigration. Brown is not a latte-sipping laissez faire economic border liberal but has pandered to anti-immigration xenophobia happily. Unfortunately it has not placated the core vote.

The analysis at Left Outside is much better than this piece.

Dave, will someone please explain what Mrs Duffy said that was so wrong?

Listening to the film, on immigration she appears to have said,
“You can’t say anything about immigrants because they’re saying that you’re …
[interrupted by GB]
…all these Eastern Europeans that are coming in … where are they flocking from …
[interrupted by GB]”

That is the entirety of her part in the exchange on immigration – and I know that some are trying to say that GB misheard her ‘flocking’ – but it doesn’t seem to me that there is anything wrong with her questions; and it appeared that she was gearing up for a question, had she been left to ask it.

The sadness of all of this is that the impression left is that so-called ‘progressives’ are keener to attach someone for being a ‘bigot’ than to engage with something that is a real issue – and involves complicated problems relating to policy on the services provided to individual communities and all sorts of related problems.

Most people are not political nerds or hacks – they think about politics occasionally – and they are not very clear about what connections there are between different parts of the things that bind our communities together (and divide them).

‘Immigration’ when I discuss it with voters on doorsteps, tend to end up with discussions about the provision of housing, school places, medical services of various sorts and jobs. Most of those I meet do not dismiss arguments that they disagree with and so cannot properly be described as ‘bigots’; they may start less informed and more informed, and sometimes we are all ignorant of detail – and, yes, where detail is provided in simplistic reporting in MSM, the nuances are missed out entirely – but listening to Mrs Duffy over the last day or so on the radio and TV, I don’t think you can fairly describe her as ‘mildly racist’.

@ Paul

What is your point? Where is the inconsistency?

It looks to me that the point of the article is that GB and Labour have not responded to some of the problems exacerbated by immigration (particularly housing and work) by, say, building more social housing, but by pandering to the right wing press. Unless I’m missing the point, you’re criticising the article for not making the point that it actually does make.

I agree with this post. And I don’t think one has to consider Mrs D even mildly racist or bigoted to do so, either. It’s only fair to her to point out that, faced with a decent argument to the effect that Rochdale’s problem is, and always has been, the fact that it’s a dead cotton town, and immigrants are only the symptom of a pre-extant problem that needs to be solved at the root, she might even have changed her mind. (That’s my reading, could be wrong. I’ve been trying to turn up some figures on this without much success). The government’s culpability in this, as you imply, is that it hasn’t even tried to win this argument. Being emollient and then going away muttering about bigotry is cowardly.

But what are the answers?

The immigration debate fails partly because of the lies and misinformation perpetuated by the likes of Dacre. But also partly because the liberal position is (correct me if I’m wrong) mostly based on a sense of humanity, internationalism, and the nebulous benefits of multi-culturalism.

Ultimately, this is what drives us to defend immigration and resist the shrieks of “Britain’s full up!”. I’d be surprised if you had any success with this approach when talking to voters.

We can use the economic argument, as Labour has done, to try and show the benefits of immigration. But to balance that with British unemployment, I think, reaches the logical and understandable conclusion of a points-based system and “British jobs for British workers” – which you seem to consider part of the problem. To not even suggest something along these lines, but blithely continue to talk about more jobs and more houses while arguing that immigration is not a problem will not work.

If you think immigration fear would disappear if everyone got a bit more money or a nicer house, I think you misunderstand what makes people tick. Most of the “bigoted” working class people are better off than they’ve ever been, working in environments relatively untouched by immigration (or, if they have had immigrants move in to the area, they probably get along with them very well!), and yet they still naturally gravitate towards that sentiment as if the “Rivers of Blood” speech happened only yesterday.

There’s a reason right-wingers have been stoking anti-immigration fears – likely for centuries. It’s because it works. The working class (though let’s not for one second think that anti-immigration feeling is restricted by class boundaries) are not mildly bigoted because the Mail tells them they should be, nor because Gordon Brown isn’t doing enough to fight this vile tide. The Mail, like populists everywhere, are only amplifying what’s already out there and pandering to prejudices that may very well be hard-wired into our DNA (or something).

Yes, this is all very defeatist. But I really don’t know what you can expect to do other than try to make a convincing argument that there are clear, material benefits to immigration that does not disadvantage your common and garden Brit. However, this needs to be supported by action, meaning – by my reckoning – an assurance of British jobs for British workers.

If it was proven that immigration genuinely was damaging (and I include EU immigration), would our liberal sensibilities accept it? Could we bring ourselves to say “get them out”, “Britain’s closed” or take the action necessary to secure a future for those that already live here?

Then the tables would be reversed. We liberals will be the ones clinging to irrational beliefs while facing the derision of those better informed. In that situation, I wonder what would help us understand…

Not highlighting the results of immigration is the problem, all 3 parties are focusing on restricting immigration but nothing else

The fact is immigration is good for this country and British business depends on it, however those who used to provide these services or those who’ve seen their jobs disappear in a changing economy have had nothing to help them.

People don’t care about the immigrants, they care about not getting a job and poor housing. Outline how you’re going to retrain, reskill and help those of all ages from every generation who’ve lost their jobs to a changing economy with a cheaper workforce.

If you can’t outline that then the BNP will win because they provide a solution, don’t let anymore in. All the 3 main parties are losing the argument because their solution isn’t being outlined or sold to the working class.

Agree with the first post. This government has been tremendously “tough” on immigration to the point where it’s getting difficult to get in or out at all. Brown has continuously stroked the bigot vote (remember “British jobs for British workers.”)

Will someone please tell Dave Osler that it’s not OK to be a racist, even if you have a built in conviction that you deserve a cheap house paid for by the rest of us? I’m sick of bigots and I’m sick of a government that listens to them. And I’m sick of people who tell us we’ve got to take their odious fantasies seriously.

@7: “And I’m sick of people who tell us we’ve got to take their odious fantasies seriously.”

Does that apply to Professor Robert Rowthorn’s paper on the economics of immigration?
http://www.civitas.org.uk/pdf/Rowthorn_Immigration.pdf

And this report of the HoL Select Committee on Economic Affairs for the 2007-8 session on: The Economic Impact of Immigration?
http://www.parliament.the-stationery-office.co.uk/pa/ld200708/ldselect/ldeconaf/82/82.pdf

Completely agree with: “a good first step would be a concerted effort to undermine its material base.”

Not sure what to make of: “But they do want answers to their concerns, and Labour stopped providing them years ago.”

If the point is that Labour stopped providing answers by a) not tackling the underlying material problems (inequality, deprivation) that cause racism and b) not advancing an explicit egalitarian, anti-racist, maximising the good for all, rhetoric then this is quite sound. Alas it sounds more akin to the standard point that these (possibly valid) concerns need addressing. I don’t think they do: aside from hammering home fact that the notion that people are losing out from immigration is completely factually baseless and rejected any sort of ‘Brits first’ preference (and explained the real cause of the ills blamed on immigrants), then there’s really nothing more to say.

Chris Mullin’s diaries are excellent on this. As only very rarely gets mentioned, the problem started because:

a) The government lied about the scale of immigration (particularly regarding the EU), and was abusive about it,
b) Didn’t consider the effect on infrastructure,
c) Stigmatised anyone who brought the subject up as “racist”.

In later years the government has got much tougher, and a bit more organised. The “tougher” part of this is indeed pandering to base instincts and is pretty repellant.

This is a problem of the government’s own making: the case for immigration is pretty easy to make. However, having failed to prepare, and then spent a few years lying about it left the government in a pretty steep hole.

The classic was EU immigration. From memory (I won’t be far out):

Those in the know said there would be about 85,000 a year from Eastern Europe.
The govt said, no. 10,000 if that.
Everyone else said no, really, about 85,000. Shouldn’t we prepare?
The govt said, No 10k. And stop scare-mongering you ignorant racist twat.

Everyone else was right.

The correct answer from the govt would have been: yes, about 85k. Is the UK popular or what? Better make sure things are in order for when they get here though.

And actually, from my experience, most people were a bit chuffed that so many chose to come here …….

Whats tory
When Maggie signed the The Single European Act (SEA) on 17 February 1986, and at The Hague on 28 February 1986. This allowed for a free moverment of people. As Poland and other Easter European countries joined the EU, there was not much they could or any government in the circumstances.
As your Tories sold off most public housing to their owners , way under the market value, their wasn’t any money left to build more public housing.

‘Nick Cohen is Tory’ – with respect when the Eastern European states joined the EU, the other major economies negotiated and obtained delays to the application of the free movement provisions of the EU treaties for citizens of those Eastern European states – and it was the UK Government at the time of the accession of those states (not Conservative) that decided that we did not need or want such restrictions to apply here. So your first criticism is directed at the wrong party.

As to the second criticism, I disagree with your conclusions – but then I would wouldn’t I (I’m one of the ‘dastardly’ opposition!).

Evan
Which countries didn’t allow the free movement of any individual in the EU and are these restrictions still in place. Could you give me the links
Ta I will be Mutterly to your Dick dastardly.

“Gillian Duffy does not come across as one of life’s natural decaf skinny latte drinkers. Welcome to the core vote, Mr Brown.”

Why do metropolitan lefties write things like this? People aren’t stereotypes, you know.

@Nick Cohen Is A Tory

You’re missing the point completely.
And what’s this “whats tory” business?

‘Nick Cohen is a Tory’ – have a look here
http://ec.europa.eu/enlargement/archives/pdf/press_corner/publications/55260_practica_guide_including_comments_en.pdf

Chris @ 15

Irony, innit?

Substitute the word “jews” or “blacks” for “eastern europeans” in Queen Duffy’s remarks, and suddenly her “valid concerns” don’t seem so valid.

@blanco. But ‘jews’ and ‘blacks’ are racial statements. ‘eastern europeans’ is a geographical reference – it doesn’t have the same resonance or historical issues creating a connotation (yet). It is probably mildly racist, but only in a vague way that betrays underlying concerns that should be addressed rather than dismissed as ‘bigoted’.

@blanco.

At least if Ms Duffy had substituted the word “jews” or “blacks” for “eastern europeans”, her desire to know where they were from might have made slightly more sense, given that eastern Europeans can only be from, er, eastern Europe.

@19

blanco,

Why would substituting the words ‘jews’ or ‘blacks’, both labels used by groups to self-identify, make the question racist? This is the sort of liberal thinking that is out of touch with people like Mrs Duffy; the assumption that by referring to groups as a whole in a general way is racist. Mrs Duffy is probably not a racist in any way (I’m sure someone would have dug the fact up if she was, unfortunately), and was using a convenient label to describe people she could identify as different to those who were in Rochdale ten years ago. That is, there were new people in the area and she had, as humans do, found a way of identifying them. If they were jews or blacks, why would that be wrong.

Now I don’t like labels (this may have been noticed by those who have the stomach to read my comments on racial politics), but people feel a need for them. And considering the need to label and classify seems integral to humans, including self-classification, then we might have to put up with use of labels without assuming that using them is racist. People like Mrs Duffy may use labels in a way that is not in accord with either my preference for seeing us all as the human race or individuals, or with the liberal sensibilities some on here have spoken of (which may be the same thing), but we cannot on that self-centred basis assume they are racists.

Now if he had typed n*****s or y***s perhaps blanco’s argument would stand, but I can’t accept blacks or jews to be racist terminology per se, or even in the context of Mrs Duffy’s question.

That said, in response to Ian and in defence of blanco’s original comment, as Eastern European was used to describe people in Rochdale, not eastern Europe, might I suggest it was meant as a label for a groups of people, and therefore comparable to Black or Jew. The origin or accuracy of a label is a seperate (and academic) issue from its use.

blanco; but she didn’t use jews or blacks so the comparison is merely to reduce the argument to absurdity and ascribe to this woman, whom none of us know, views that we simply cannot know she holds.

One of the things that has impressed me most as a candidate and as a campaigner is the essential decency of the vast majority of the people that I meet – in the last few years I have met only a handful of people who I came away from feeling saddened by the encounter. My experience makes me optimistic and positive about people that I have not met – and it has to be understood that many are not as eloquent or linguistically able as those that post on Liberal Conspiracy and elsewhere – but the fact that people often use language in ways that are misunderstood is simply a fact of life and it is entirely mistaken, in my view, to assume the worst and to change the language that has been used to create an argument and impression that simply doesn’t arise from the original words.

Of course, we should treat what politicians say with greater scrutiny and expose that language to all the tools of argument – but to use those same tools in the same way against the language used by someone who is merely accidentally in the news is to betray an essential intolerance and prejudice against that person that is, I think, unfair.

David Osler – you’re wasting your time.

LC has decided that Mrs Duffy is in fact a bigot and that Brown’s only crime was not to tell her to her face.

Dissolving the people and electing another is the only way forward.

the assumption that by referring to groups as a whole in a general way is racist.

Oh dear. Referring to groups, ethnic/national, as a whole isn’t racist?

This is pathetic. You’d argue the KKK weren’t racist, that it was just about legitimate grievances that must be addressed.

See?

@26 – I dont think its racist to refer to a group as a whole based on something they share in common (which will usually be place of birth). Its racist to make assumptions about those people.

blanco,

I’d argue by their nature, their exclusive composition and their objectives the Klu Klux Klan are racist. I don’t think they have any legitimate grievances, although I don’t take much interest in them so feel free to try and convince me (I will look at points of view before dismissing them; don’t hold out much hope for the Klu Klux Klan from my rather superficial knowledge of them though).

But your answer seems to be the epitome of the metropolitan liberal disdain that Mr Brown revealed so well. You imply that referring to ethnic/national groups as a whole is racism. So presumably making a comment that the Greeks have got a bit of an economic problem is racist? Get a grip; racism is an evil thing, discriminating against others on the grounds of who they are, not their individual actions. Labelling others certainly helps racism, but is not in itself harmful (for all I think that government should stop using labels to make integration easier); the use of labels can be racist, but there is no logical leap from that to the use of labels must be racist, which is what you appear to have done.

Perhaps Mrs Duffy isn’t as good as expressing herself in such circumstances as commenters here would be. Perhaps people who read racism into comments that might merely be expressions of concerns about immigration are themselves guilty of making unwarranted assumptions.

Thanks Evan
But could you tell me which countries in Europe don’t allow Poles or if any Pole is now restricted from living in any European country.
I have Polish mates and they seem to have relatives in both France, Holland and Germany.
There is a good article by a Polish journalist in the Guardian about casual racism aimed at Eastern Europeans.
I do feel that Mrs Duffy is getting a raw deal because she didn’t ask to be the centre of this mess.

Thanks Evan
But could you tell me which countries in Europe don’t allow Poles or if any Pole is now restricted from living in any European country.
I have Polish mates and they seem to have relatives in France, Holland and Germany.
There is a good article by a Polish journalist in the Guardian about casual racism aimed at Eastern Europeans.
I do feel that Mrs Duffy is getting a raw deal because she didn’t ask to be the centre of this mess.

I think that as the accession occurred in 2004, we have now passed the time when the transitional provisions apply – but you will need to have a look at the European Commission website for the position to be certain.

I have no doubt that there is real resentment about ‘outsiders’ and that much of that resentment is irrational and based on ill-informed prejudice rather than any substance. What I find interesting is that when you talk to almost anyone about immigrants – whatever their political outlook – they will tell you that they don’t mean the people who run the Indian restaurant that they use ‘who are delightful and hard working’ or the Polish couple who run the late night mini market that they use ‘who are open all the time’ … we can all probably cite examples.

Prejudice exists in all communities – have a look at Conservative supporting blogs and you will see the prejudice against individuals that the people have never met – and have a look at the casual and ill informed prejudice exposed on this blog and in the comments. Engaging with people will inevitably require you to confront your prejudices – and that is a ‘good’ thing, I think; but simply, on the flimsiest of evidence and on a single expression that you disagree with, to accuse others of unacceptable prejudice is, in my view, foolish.

So there is free movement of Eastern Europeans now in every EU country. So whatever party, apart from UKIP and BNP, they cannot stop Eastern europeans settling and working in this country.

good to see you’re defending the KK cjcjc.

@blanco. But ‘jews’ and ‘blacks’ are racial statements. ‘eastern europeans’ is a geographical reference – it doesn’t have the same resonance or historical issues creating a connotation (yet).

This is patently silly. What matters is if you discriminate against a group solely on the basis of a part of their identity. If people started saying they wouldn’t employ Eastern Europeans because they were ‘lazy and dirty’ for example, you wouldn’t see that as a problem?